When I was 18 years old and was in-between colleges (waiting for another semester to start), I got a job as the Sports Editor of a bi-weekly newspaper in Morehead, Kentucky. My job, they told me, was to report on all the local sports, both college and high school. Perfect. Right up my alley.
And then they dropped the bomb.
I had to do a Man on the Street interview for each week. I would take a picture of five local citizens and ask them a question, such as, “Do you plan to vote this year?”
My first few weeks featured mostly people I knew. My boss then made a rule I couldn’t use anyone under 25 years old. Then another rule that I couldn’t be related to them. And then he said that I couldn’t give them $10 or offer to wash their car.
So I hung out at the post office, a solitary figure with a notepad and camera stalking people as they came to get their mail. It was pathetic.
For a while I was IN the Post Office, until people complained. Then I was on the front steps of the Post Office until later I moved (involuntarily) to the sidewalk in front of the Post Office. Then I moved to the Trademore Shopping Center out near Interstate 64.
Normal people didn’t want to talk to me. The people that would, well, their answers weren’t all that newsworthy.
Question: Where do you see yourself in five years?
Answer: Well, unless they move this bench, I’ll be right here. You gonna eat all of that banana?
I tried taking photos of people who were from out of town and then making up quotes. “Excuse me sir (or ma’am),” I’d say, “Are you from around here? Well, then can I take photos of you?"
For some reason, this didn’t work either.
The pictures were due Sunday and the copy on Monday morning. The film went into a dropbox. The slot was about three feet above the floor. So one week after killing myself and getting no results, I had an idea. I took the film out of the camera, put the cap on very loosely and dropped it into the box.
“Bad news, DT,” my editor told me. “The film cap popped off when you dropped it in the slot and the photos were ruined. So we’ll do two questions next week.”
Hmm…I hadn’t thought of that.
