The history of Mackinac Island and the War of 1812 in the Northern part of what is now Michigan and Ontario is actually a trilogy of events that lead to the eventual British Victory in the North. In the 19th Century communication was a slow and dangerous journey for the couriers that carried messages from the larger posts in the south. This was both a help and a hindrance to the theatre in the north. Fort Mackinac was built by the British 1780 near the end of the American Revolution as the island fort better defended than the old French fort, Fort Michilimackinac, on theRead More →

You see them all over universities, little memorials, gifts, and the such. The University of Findlay in lovely Findlay, Ohio, is no different, and this week’s subject is one such memorial. This is the restored bell that once sat in the tower of the Old Main building. It was given as a gift to the university, fully restored and mounted on a new tower from the classes of 1953 and 2003. I thankfully met up with the FPP gang at Findlay to catch the final day of Walking Workshop after a couple of rough nights of attempting to camp, but Sunday dawned bright, sunny andRead More →

Rain, rain on my face It hasn’t stopped raining for days My world is a flood Slowly I become one with the mud One of the first bands I liked and have now had the pleasure of meeting is Jars of Clay; their song flood inspired the title for Week 8. We continue to slog through a brutal winter in North America, but for a few beautiful days, the temperature came above freeze…enough for it to rain on one of those days before dropping again. So I decided to stay inside and go a little abstract and catch the rain drops on my office windows.Read More →

I was introduced to the small Indiana town of Crown Point last May. I was instantly drawn to the 1873 Italianate/Second Empire historic Lake County courthouse at the centre of the downtown. So I knew I had to include this beautiful building in this year’s project. Sadly with all the parking around the square, it was hard to find a good angle, so this is the one I ended up settling on. Of course, as soon as I started setting up the camera, I soon found plenty of locals watching me closing, a young man with an Ontario-plated car in a small town in Indiana;Read More →

Last week Sunday was August 19th, to most people it’s just another Sunday, but August 19th is World Photography Day…why the 19th, simple, it was on August 19th, 1839 that France gave the world a gift, the gift of Photography. You see earlier that year (January 9th) Joseph Nicèphore Nièpce and Louis Daguerre developed the photographic process and the French Academy of Sciences passed it along to the world. So after church that morning I loaded up a roll of Kodak Tmax 100 into my Rolleiflex and hit a local hiking trail, Mount Nemo. World Photography Day was created in 2009 and launched in 2010Read More →

The term Burlington Heights is a misnomer, as the Heights are technically located in Hamilton. But during the Anglo-American War of 1812, Burlington Heights became home to an often forgotten fort. Burlington Heights started life as a simple farm owned by Richard Besley. When the Americans invaded and captured the Niagara Region in May 1813 and forced the full retreat of the British Army of the Center, they would establish an armed camp at Burlington Heights, today located at the border of Hamilton, Ontario and Burlington, Ontario. It would start as a simple structure with field fortifications to provide a rallying point for the BritishRead More →