For more information:
• Biography and photo samples from Masters of Photography

Living the Photographic Life

Photojournalist Sam Abell

Sam Abell graduated from the University of Kentucky in the late 1960s. Not long after, at only 25, he landed one of the world’s plum jobs for anyone interested in making a career of photography: as a staff photographer for the National Geographic Society. He has worked there ever since, traveling the world to create in-depth photo essays for National Geographic magazine and various book projects.

Sam has published several books of his own, on themes ranging from the Civil War to gardens—a favorite subject. In Sam Abell: The Photographic Life, a sort of pictorial autobiography, he chronicled his own work while exploring the aesthetic and emotional differences between color and black-and-white photography.

In between, Sam has maintained a career as a teacher and mentor to other photographers, including a position as director of the Center for Photographic Projects in Santa Fe. As a writer, he is heard from time to time on National Public Radio.

For more information:
• SomernitesCruise.com

Producer, videographer, editor: Ernie Lee Martin

Cruisin’

Somernites Cruises

If you’re a fan of classic cars, or perhaps a child of the American Graffiti era who remembers long summer nights of “cruising the strip,” then Pulaski County is the place you gotta be.

On the fourth Saturday of each month from April to October, downtown Somerset hosts the Somernites Cruise, one of the largest regular car cruises in America. Open to antique automobiles, classic show cars, muscle cars, street rods, and highly modified late models, the event regularly draws car enthusiasts from all over the eastern U.S. There’s no judging; this event is strictly about the all-American love of classic wheels. Afternoons bring “show and shine,” when the cars are on display for their admirers in a show area, while the evening is reserved for a cruise along a blocked-off portion of Highway 27 lined by thousands of spectators.

The Somernites Cruise is organized and run by a crew of local volunteers, who arrange for food vendors, shuttle buses to local shopping outlets, and appropriate cruising music. We met two of them, Darrell and Keith Floyd, on our visit in the summer of 2004.