Dorothea Lange’s images of ditch bank settlements during the 1930s were both icons and indictments of poverty during the Great Depression.Today, in many parts of California, conditions are just as bad, or worse. Immigrant farm workers pay an arm and a leg for substandard housing in garages, residential hotels, backyard sheds, and derelict campers. Thousands camp in gullies, dry washes, and tickets. During the wine grape harvest in the Napa Valley, field hands take over the back yard at the St. Helena Catholic church and sleep along the Napa River.
I am a bilingual, academically-trained historian/photojournalist (Ph. D. Wisconsin), author of a multi-volume scholarly history of California farmworkers. I founded my own business, Streetshots agricultural photography. For 30 years I worked as an agricultural photographer/journalist, defined broadly, in order to remain submerged in the industry that is the setting for my field of expertise.
Awards Maine Media Award for Photojournalism
Howard Chapnick Award for Photojournalism
Mark Lynton History Award
Best Agricultural Reporting In California
Guggenheim Fellowship
