Cruising Rural South Central Washington

Years ago, when I was young and strong, I sometimes hiked on Mount Rainier in south central Washington state. Back then, I did not do urban decay photography and did not pay attention to the rural towns south of Seattle. Finally, in summer of 2023, I had a chance to revisit the area and take a few snapshots. These towns were probably a lot more interesting in the 1970s, when the lumber industry was beginning to wind down and western Washington state had not gone through its conversion from a resource extraction economy to a high technology, finance, and arts economy. 

I sometimes regret not photographing good grunge when it was available. However, many people argue with plenty of backup evidence that infrastructure and small town society in USA has deteriorated in recent decades. The rural South certainly shows this pattern. But even here in the Pacific Northwest, I expect to find interesting material to photograph in the future as I explore. 

Let us take a short drive from Olympia towards Paradise, on the south side of Mount Rainier. 

Looking for coffee in Rainier

Rainier is a former lumber town and appears to be a bit rough. I want to explore soon.

 

Mountain Highway E, La Grande, Washington

Old La Grande Post Office

La Grande is an unincorporated community in Pierce County. Most people heading to Mount Rainier buzz on through in a hurry.

Elbe, Washington

The Mount Rainier Scenic Railway runs between the towns of Elbe and Mineral. I am not sure if the cars on the siding above are currently used or if the railroad has other rolling stock. 

  

Time for coffee in Ashford

Keep driving east and going up in elevation, and you pass Ashford. There is not much there, but you could pick up a coffee.

Copper Creek Inn

Near the Nisqually entrance to Mount Rainier National Park is the Copper Creek Inn, Cabins, and Lodge. They claim that this is the oldest continuously-operating restaurant in the state, in business since 1946. We has a superb salmon meal, and their blackberry pie is a piece of berry and culinary heaven (dare I compare it with the chocolate baklava at Niko Niko's in Houston??). Regardless, I am heading back to Copper Creek. 

Mount Rainier is an impressive stratovolcano, rising to 14,410 ft above sea level. I have not climbed to the summit but have walked a section of the Wilderness Trail, which circles the mountain. The Paradise visitor center on the south side of the mountain is mobbed in summer with tourists. Plan ahead, go early.

Snow lake - you can't see the mosquitoes

Snow Lake is an easy walk from the Stevens Pass Road, a short distance from the Paradise Visitor's Center. The highest elevation is 4,700 ft (1440 m), so easy breathing. In June, the mosquitoes were not easy!! 

At Tugboat Annie's, Olympia

Back to Olympia and dinner at Tugboat Annie's. Someone is still in the 1970s with his VW dune buggy.

I took most of the photographs with expired Kodak Bright Sun (= Gold 100) film using my Voigtländer Vito BL camera. The 50mm ƒ/3.5 Color-Skopar lens (a 4-element Tessar design) always performs well. I exposed the film at EI=100, but for the next roll, I will give more exposure (EI=64). The film is more grainy than fresh rolls, and some of the colors are a bit off. It was a worthwhile experiment, and I have three more rolls to use. 

The Wide View in South-Central Jackson (Hasselblad XPan 08)

Jackson, Mississippi, is fun for my type of photography because so much of the city is rough (I am trying to be polite). Let's continue our explorations using the Hasselblad XPan panoramic camera. Here are some examples of south Jackson around South State Street and Gallatin Street. This frames are from Kodak Portra 160 film, expired since 2013 but frozen for all of its life. Click any picture to expand it to 2400 pixels.

South State Street view north (45mm F/4 lens at ƒ/11)

Anyone here? 330 S. Rankin Street, Jackson

South State Street was once prosperous and lined with car dealers and various other businesses. Not today. Heading west, South Rankin Street may be even more desolate. I took black and white photographs here in 2020.  

South Gallatin Street view north (45mm lens)

Warehouses, South Gallatin Street

Addison Auto Body, 828 S. Gallatin Street (30mm ƒ/5.6 lens)

Turn north on South Gallatin Street, and there is a bit more commercial activity. The road dips under the early-20th century railroad girder overpass, which is in regular use. I have photographed along here in the past. 

South State Street (BW400CN film, Voigtländer Vito BL camera, 50mm ƒ/3.5 Color-Skopar lens)

As a comparison, here is the view of South State Street taken on black and white film with my 1959 Voigtländer Vito BL camera and its 4-element 50mm ƒ/3.5 Color-Skopar lens. The XPan's lenses are modern, sophisticated, and amazingly capable on the 68mm wide frame, but this simple 4-element Skopar (a Tessar-type of design) holds its own for the normal 35mm frame. 

Railroad overpass, S. Gallatin at W. Porter Street (TMax 100 film, Rolleiflex 3.5E 75mm Xenotar lens, 1/250 ƒ8, yellow filter)

Here is the north side of the railroad bridge where West Porter Street intersects South Gallatin. This is from my 1959 Rolleiflex camera. Hmmm, how come this "antique" equipment works?

Standby for more Jackson photographs next week.

Vinny the Voigtländer Vito BL does Jackson (Abandoned Films 08a)

Introduction

Mr. Vinny, my little Voigtländer Vito BL camera, shares shelf space with a bunch of other cameras. He does not get out nearly often enough. Although well over 60, Vinnie is still a sturdy, well-built little fellow (I wish I could say the same for me). He has a rigid body and a 50mm ƒ/3.5 Color-Skopar lens. This is a unit-focus 4-element lens, Voigtländer’s masterful 1949 revision of the classic Tessar formula. This may be one of the best of these post-war 4-element lenses, and, of course, it was was fully-coated. The refined lens and the precision of the entire system contributes to Vinnie’s excellent optical output.

Last October (2021), I heard Vinny say, "Come on, take me to the big city." I loaded a roll of Kodak BW400CN film and took Vinnie to Jackson. 

BW400CN Film

BW400CN was a C-41 monochrome film. It was intended to be used by photographers who wanted convenient black and white prints from any store or photo shop with a C-41 processing machine. Kodak discontinued it in 2014.

I have mixed feelings about the BW. Sometimes, the tonality was very pleasing and the results looked good; other times, the dark areas were muddy and nasty. Even though Kodak claimed that it was extra fine grain, I found it to be surprisingly grainy and it often looked gritty. But that sometimes worked for me because I frequent gritty places. Regardless, I had three rolls left to use. I exposed them at EI=320 but probably should have given more exposure. This group of Jackson pictures is from the first roll, which may have degraded with time. It was X-rayed at least once during a trip to Asia, which may account for some loss of sensitivity and fog.

If you want a current film that can be processed in C-41 chemicals, Ilford still sells its XP-2 in 135 and 120 sizes.

East Jackson

Junior Achievement of Mississippi, High Street, Jackson

This is the abandoned Junior Achievement building at the very east end of High Street, just below the Pearl River levee. The organization educated young people in business and economic issues, taught them financial literacy, and prepared them for work and careers. However, Junior Achievement of Mississippi failed in the 2009 recession and left its building behind.

Bayou at High Street, Jackson (1/300 ƒ/11, green filter)

This is a typical bayou, or stream. This one separates Junior Achievement beyond the thicket to the left from the BMW automobile dealer off to the right. This bayou may be too small to support any alligators, but I avoid wandering down in the brush and muck.

Morris Ice Company, 652 S. Commerce Street, Jackson (yellow filter)

Morris Ice Company, 652 S. Commerce Street, Jackson

The former Morris Ice Company is an interesting time capsule of early 20th century industry. Ice was critical in the hot southern summers for hospitals, food preservation, brewing, food shipment, and keeping your martini chilled. Mr. Pickering, who was planning to redevelop the old factory, let me photograph inside in 2019. The Covid must have disrupted his plans because I have not seen any changes there since 2019. But a company that builds wood canoes still rents part of the space.

South State Street, view north (1/300 ƒ/11, yellow filter)

Dot Com Motors, 1011 S. State Street, Jackson (1/300 ƒ/11, yellow filter)

State Street is a major north-south street running through the heart of Jackson, The southern part of State is pretty grungy, with closed car dealers, tire shops, and warehouses. The Corvette in the first photograph has been perched on its post for at least three decades. A former fast food restaurant once hosted Dot Com Motors. I supposed it wanted to be modern.

West Jackson

Tarrymore Motel, Hwy 80 west, Jackson

Former Coca Cola bottling plant, 1421 Hwy 80 west, Jackson (1/125 ƒ/16-22)

During the post World War II era, Highway US 80 west was a thriving industrial and commercial area. Old-timers recall sophisticated restaurants and motels, and major companies established factories there. 

Today, Hwy 80 is a wasteland of closed hotels, empty factories (like the Coca Cola bottling plant in the photograph above), low-end fast food restaurants, payday loan shops, used car dealers, and abandoned warehouses. Homeless people have occupied old hotels and stripped the fittings. I am baffled and have no explanation for the decay. But this is not unique to Jackson; many other American cities have experienced the same hollowing out and decay of their infrastructure. 

Long-term readers may remember that I have photographed on Hwy 80 before. It gets worse as the years pass. 

4986 Hwy 80 (west of Metrocenter Mall)

Summary

Vinny enjoyed his outing to the big city of Jackson. His Prontor shutter is accurate, and his little 4-element Color-Skopar lens is highly capable, sharp, and free from obvious flare. He demonstrates top quality German precision manufacturing and has aged well (better than I have!). Thank you for sharing his excursion.

The Kodak BW400CN film worked out well for these frames. It is grainy, but that is fine for some topics. The film has been discontinued, and I recommend you readers not bother trying to find any. Use Kodak Tri-X or Fuji Acros instead. I will post more photographs from this last group of BW400CN rolls in the future.

 

Appendix A, Filters

Voigtländer filters are confusing to buy because the company used a numerical code to describe their various types. The table below summarizes the filters available in the 1950s and 1960s. A label such as 301/32 meant type 301 filter (light yellow) in the 32mm size. Some of their lenses used filters that pushed on, but others were threaded in various sizes. For the smaller lenses on Vito cameras, an alternative is to buy a 32mm Series VI adapter and mount Series VI filters. These are inexpensive but somewhat inconvenient in the field. The genuine Voigtländer filters are elegant, coated, and compact. Focar filters were for magnification, i.e., diopters.

 

Voigtländer Filters
Name	Type	Factor	Code
G1	Light yellow	1.5	301/32
G2	Med. Yellow	2	302/32
Gr	Light green	4	306/32
Or	Orange	5	308/32
Uv	Haze		317/32
85C or A	Color correction		318/32
SF	Skylight		325/32
Focar 1			303/32
Focar 2			304/32
Focar 0	f = 2m		342
Focar A	f = 1m		343
Focar B	f = 0.5m		344
Focar C	f = 0.5m		345
Focar D	f = 0.15m		348
Hood			310/32
Note: /xx means lens diameter. 32 is push-on.

Expired Film Treasure: 135-size GAF Versapan Black and White Film (Abandoned Films 04)

 

Background

Dear Readers, this will be a continuation of my irregular series about discontinued photographic films ("Film from the Dead"). It sounds very photo-geeky, but don't worry, there will be urban decay examples and even some "pretty" pictures. 

I have written about older films before. Long-term readers may remember that in spring of 2020, my friend gave me a cooler full of GAF Versapan 4×5" film packs. He had stored them in freezers since the 1960s. They proved to be completely viable, and I liked the results so much, I looked for other sizes of Versapan film on eBay. Amazingly, a fellow listed three rolls of 135 size (regular 35mm) with 1974 expiration, which he claimed had been frozen. Well, that was too good to resist, so I bought them. 

Some of you old-timers may remember when GAF sold many types of film in the United States (I am not sure about foreign distribution). The black and white emulsions were well-regarded, and I do not know why they stopped production of consumer products in the 1970s. This was 30 years before the digital tsunami overwhelmed the film companies, so digital is not a culprit here. GAF stands for General Aniline & Film Co., an old-line film company from Binghamton, New York. The history of this company is complicated and was intertwined with ANSCO and Agfa. Read a more detailed history on Mike Eckman's excellent review of an ANSCO Super Regent camera. 

Technical Notes

I loaded my first roll of Versapan in a Pentax Spotmatic II camera at exposure index (EI) of 100 and used part of the roll around Vicksburg. Then I exposed the second half in my Leica M2 camera. I sent the roll to Northeast Photographic in Bath, Maine, to develop in Xtol developer. Xtol is an amazingly effective developer and appears to work well with almost any black and white emulsion. The negatives displayed high base fog, which is common for old film, but plenty of density and detail. For my second roll, I exposed at EI=64 in a Vito BL camera.

I scanned the negatives with a Plustek 7600i scanner. The Silverfast Ai scanning software did not have a Versapan profile (obviously), but with some experimenting, I selected the profile for Kodak BW400CN film. This was surprising because BW400CN was a chromogenic film (C-41 development used for color print films), but regardless, I liked the way it handled the Versapan. But for some frames, the Kodak Plus-X profile looked better. 

Vicksburg

Clay Street view west to the Yazoo Canal (50mm ƒ/1.4 SMC Takumar lens, 1/125 ƒ/5.6½)

Back of 1220 Washington Street (24mm ƒ/3.5 SMC Takumar lens)

Ergon Refinery, Haining Road, Port of Vicksburg (55mm ƒ/1.8 Super-Takumar lens)

Tracks under I-20 bridge (135mm ƒ/3.5 SMC Takumar lens, 1/30 ƒ/5.6½, yellow-green filter)

Smith's Appliances, Magnolia Road (35mm ƒ/2.0 Summicron-M lens)

Smith's Appliances is full of interesting automobile and filling station memorabilia. Thank you Mr. Smith for generously letting me take pictures inside. This was a 1-sec exposure with the Leica camera placed on a shelf.

Bamboo grove, Confederate Avenue, Vicksburg National Military Park (50mm Summicron lens)

Bridge over Stouts Bayou, Letitia Street (Vito BL camera, 1/30 ƒ/5.6)

Collapsing church, Glass Road (Vito BL camera, 1/30 ƒ/11, yellow filter)

Edwards

Abandoned trailer, US 80 approx. 1 mile east of Edwards (35mm ƒ/2.0 Summicron-M lens) 

East of Edwards, US 80 is the frontage road just south of I-20. I do not know if this was the alignment of 80 originally or if the old road bed was subsumed by the interstate. West of Edwards, 80 is the original 1920s roadway.

Utica

Burks Gro, Utica (Vito BL camera)

Delta and Waverly, Louisiana

Silos off Levee Road south of Delta, Louisiana (50mm ƒ/2.0 Summicron-DR lens, orange filter)

Farm shed on LA 577 south of Waverly, Louisiana (Vito BL camera, 1 sec. ƒ/5.6)

Port Gibson and Yokena

Cottage on Ingleside Karnac Ferry Road, Port Gibson (Voigtländer Vito BL camera)

Alexander Road, Yokena (Voigtländer Vito BL camera)

The woods north of Port Gibson have some interesting old cottages and grungy trailers off the winding roads. I need to return to explore some more.

Avon

Abandoned farm, Riverside Road, Avon, Mississippi

Conclusions

This was a pleasant surprise! Amazingly, this Versapan still works and looks great. I love the tonality for my type of pictures. It shows that 50-year old black and white film that has been cool-stored can be used years after its expiration date. One roll of Versapan is left in my freezer - on hold for a future project.

These ancient Versapans were definitely more grainy than Fuji Acros or even contemporary Kodak Tri-X. Versapan looks like an old-school mid-speed film, like Plus-X. Well, no wonder, it is 50 years old. It gave many of my pictures a gritty press photography look, which I like for urban decay. Looking at the original TIFF files carefully, I can see many tiny white spots in the negatives. I think they are not bubbles from development but rather deterioration of the emulsion. Resized at 1600 pixels to show here on the web, the spots are invisible. 

It is fun to experiment with old films, but you need some assurance on how they were stored. 

The next article will be on Kodak Panatomic-X film in 135 size.  

Appendix

Please click the link for the data sheet that came with the GAF Versapan film. They list the film speed as ASA 125/22 DIN. Unfortunately, it does not provide any development times for contemporary film developers. 

Virus in Vicksburg - a Quick Overview (B&W film)

Introduction

Dear readers, I will take a short interruption from my Route 66 series to write about the Virus in Vicksburg. The coronavirus has caused almost unprecedented disruptions to commercial activity around the world. I wrote "almost unprecedented" because the great flu influenza of 1917 caused similar confusion and disruption to the World War I generation. Worldwide, the 1918-1919 influenza may have killed between 50 and 100 million people (from Dr. Fauci in a CNN Special). 

Read The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History by John M. Barry to see how the world coped at that time. We Americans were much tougher and less selfish and self-obsessed back then. But even then, we had political appointees who underplayed the danger of the flu for commercial reasons, which led to thousands of excess deaths. And then we had idiots who did the "masks impose on my rights" nonsense. Especially sobering to read are details of the second wave of influenza in late 1918. This second wave may have accounted for the majority of deaths around the world, many in poor regions like India. In total, about 675,000 Americans died. Will we see a second wave of COVID this time? (Update: Yes!)

A New Jersey friend asked if I had been taking virus pictures around Vicksburg. I wondered, how could I show what was different than normal? A hundred photo web pages recommend lame virus exercises such as "How to photograph an egg in creative light" or "Get closer to your pet or your broccoli for the most impactful portraits." OK, maybe if you are totally confined indoors and are totally bored. But here in Vicksburg, Mississippi, we arre not confined indoors, and I thought of some topics.

Quieter streets

Photographers around the world have shown pictures of their normally mobbed streets being completely empty. The Weather Channel had an article documenting penguins, lions, bears, bison, and other critters reclaiming now-empty city streets. Vicksburg has also been quiet, but it does not look drastically different from normal, and we do not have bison or penguins. The streets here have traffic but usually not bumper-to-bumper. As a bicyclist, the quiet streets are very welcome. Night-time is gloriously quiet. The mayor wisely enacted a curfew from 11:00 pm to 05:00 am, and for once we do not hear crapped-out jalopy cars clunking down the street at all hours of the night, rap music thumping. Now, we can hear tree frogs or an occasional tug on the Mississippi River. It would be so nice if this curfew stayed in effect indefinitely.

The Vicksburg from the corner of Monroe and China Streets (Kodak Panatomic-X film, Rolleiflex 3.5E with 75mm ƒ/3.5 Xenotar lens) 

Spring Street view north, Vicksburg, Mississippi, USA (Panatomic-X film, Hasselblad 501CM, 250mm ƒ5.6 Sonnar lens)

Polk Street view east, Vicksburg, Mississippi (4×5" Tri-X film, 135mm ƒ/4.5 Schneider Xenar lens)

Speed Street view west, Vicksburg, Mississippi (Rolleiflex 3.5E Xenotar, Tri-X 400 film)

On this last picture, I caught a car in motion. Normally, Speed Street is much busier

Casinos

They are are closed! Normally, they are open 24 hours. The casinos are situated along the banks of the Mississippi River. Here are two examples.

WaterView Casino closed for virus (4×5" Tri-X Prof. film, 180mm ƒ/5.6 Caltar IIN lens)

Ameristar Casino closed for virus, Vicksburg, Mississippi, USA (4×5" Tri-X film, 90mm ƒ/6.8 Angulon lens)

No more tour boats

Up through February (2020), three or four river tour boats per week moored at the Vicksburg waterfront. The river cruise business was devastated by the 2007-2008 recession but had nicely recovered. The tourists took busses to the Vicksburg National Military Park, to museums, and to some of the churches. I am not sure if they spent all that much in town, but it was nice to see visitors. This is a photograph of the "America" moored at the waterfront during happier times in 2019. We also saw many visitors from Europe, especially music lovers who drove Route US 61, the "Blues Highway," but they, too, are not here now.

Paddlewheeler "America," Levee Street, Vicksburg, Mississippi (Fuji Acros film, Voigtlander Vito BL camera, 50mm ƒ/3.5 Color-Scopar lens, Leitz polarizer)

Industrial activity

The Port of Vicksburg is still operating, but traffic is definitely less. 18-wheeler trucks still rumble by with timber, lime, cement, or petroleum products, but there are fewer private cars and pickup trucks. The tank cars in the photograph below have been sitting on the siding for months. Possibly they are being used to store refined petroleum, but I am not sure.

Haining Road view east, Vicksburg, Mississippi (4×5" Tri-X film, 180mm ƒ/5.6 Caltar IIN lens)

Haining Road view west, Vicksburg, Mississippi (4×5" Tri-X film, 180mm ƒ/5.6 Caltar IIN lens)

Lesser changes

Even the gas stations are a bit quieter some of the time. But some places in town look about the same as ever. Clay Street has a lot of traffic. The dudes of a certain demographic still hang around the gas station convenience stores and the car wash places, as if they did not read the warnings about not gathering in groups. And almost none of them wear masks. They think they are immune?

Top Five, 1108 Bowmar Avenue, Vicksburg, Mississippi (Leica IIIC, 50mm ƒ/1.4 Canon lens)

Closing comments

The virus restrictions have been more relaxed here than in many big cities, where people had to stay indoors for weeks. I live in a big old southern house and have plenty of chores and repairs to do. My wife and I can go out and take photographs, walk, or ride bikes. We have coped with no issues at all. We did not consume or ingest any disinfectant or malaria medicine as per the "medical" recommendations from the White House.

We were fortunate that Vicksburg's mayor was proactive about closing businesses where people gather. And, at least initially, the Governor of Mississippi was more cautious and medical-directed than many other southern governors. The State Health Officer has served the citizens of Mississippi diligently. Compare and contrast with the political hacks in Georgia (Kemp), Florida (DeSantis), South Dakota (Noem), and Texas (Greg Abbott). But Mississippi's opening the economy still proved deadly for health outcomes. And the autumn school schedule turned into a shitstorm (a wildly chaotic and unmanageable situation, controversy, or sequence of events) when the Governor mandated that schools open on schedule in his attempt to suck-up up to President Trump and/or Senator Hyde-Smith.

One benefit of having a bit more spare time was reviving my 4×5 inch Tachihara camera. I was embarrassed that I had not used it since 2012. The equipment to xpose big pieces of film and take real photographs sitting in a closet, year after year? I retrieved the kit from the closet, checked the lenses and shutters, and loaded some film holders in a dark closet. At first, I was awkward, but the technique came back quickly. The Tachihara is a wooden field camera and must be used on a tripod. Press photographers in the 1940s successfully hand-held 4×5" Speed Graphics (you have seen them in movies accompanied with big flash bulb reflectors), but mine does not have any sort of rangefinder. I even bought a 1960s Schneider 90mm ƒ/6.8 Angulon lens, a tiny optic that is easy to carry.

Here in town, I found a handy advantage to the reduced traffic: I can set up a tripod in a street and not have any issues. If I wear my orange National Park Service vest, some drivers stop, thinking that I am a surveyor or city employee.

We will get through this. So will you Urban Decay readers. Be well, be careful, don't go stupid with this "reopening the economy" propaganda and go to bars, casinos, Republican political rallies, motorcycle rallies, or parties. And don't forget to photograph your world, explore, and leave a film legacy for your descendants.