For more information:
• Contemplative Images, P.O. Box 1647, Middlesboro, KY 40965, (606) 248-4883
• AGPix, a web site that connects photographers with potential photo buyers, has a list of Chuck’s credits.
• Some online samples: wildflowers and waterfalls of the Smoky Mountains

Producer, videographer: Cheryl Beckley

Worshipping with a Camera

photographer Chuck Summers

Chuck Summers of Middlesboro is an ordained Baptist minister and a professional nature photographer. For him, the one is an extension of the other: His photographs document and celebrate the wonders of creation and invite the viewer to reflection and meditation.

Originally from Paducah, Chuck now lives and works at the other end of the state. He also has traveled extensively around the country, photographing various national parks. But he found his true inspiration right in his own Bell County backyard, in Cumberland Gap National Historic Park. Other favorite subjects are also nearby at the Big South Fork National Recreation Area and Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

Chuck has published several books of his photographs and, through his company, Contemplative Images, created a line of notecards and calendars.

For more information:
• Underwood Fine Metal Arts, 1540 Shore Acres, Frankfort, KY 40601, (859) 873-9565

Producer: Cheryl Beckley
Videographer: David Brinkley

Heavy Metal

sculptor Jeff Underwood

Our second artist for this edition is Jeff Underwood of Frankfort, a metal sculptor who describes himself as an abstract expressionist with a dash of realism. His work is both art and craft, with some pieces residing in museums and others gracing people’s yards and gardens.

A juried member of the Kentucky Craft Marketing Program, Jeff creates stylized animals and flowers. Some are painted by the artist, while others are meant to provide their own patina through rusting.

For more information:
• About the bridge from the design firm
• Story on the bridge opening from the Cincinnati Enquirer, January 13, 2001

Producer: Marsha Cooper Hellard
Videographer: Brandon Wickey
Audio: Chuck Burgess

Over the River in Style

the William H. Harsha Bridge

Joyce Vize may not think of herself as an artist, but she’s a metal sculptor, too. And her work is seen—and used—by thousands of people every day.

A Maysville welder, Joyce is one of the hundreds of workers who made the visionary William H. Harsha Bridge a reality. This futuristic-looking span across the Ohio River between Maysville and Aberdeen, Ohio is the first cable-stayed bridge in Kentucky, and one of only a few in the country. It spans a total of 2,100 feet, and the main towers are 332 feet tall.

For the 2003 edition of the Kentucky Life TeleFund “road show,” we talked with Maysville Mayor David Cartmell about the impact of the bridge on the local economy. This time around, the focus is on the construction itself, as Joyce and chief engineer William B. Caroland talk with host Dave Shuffett about planning and working on the project.

Unlike suspension bridges, in which the roadbed hangs from vertical cables, a cable-stayed bridge holds itself up through tension on diagonally stretched cables. This arrangement can be vulnerable to “bridge gallop” if wind and rain arise in just the right configuration. (The most notorious example was the Tacoma Narrows Bridge, which was captured twisting itself into ribbons in one of the most famous real-life disaster films ever made.) But the Harsha Bridge incorporates the latest advances in engineering know-how as well as state-of-the-art materials to guarantee stability. It has won several major engineering awards as well as raves for its striking design.