My dad was a career Army officer so I basically lived everywhere until college.

I went to LaSalle in Philadelphia for my BA (Social Work).

Then went to the U of New Hampshire for a masters in Deaf Education. Finished my course work, but never the thesis.

By that time I was teaching and had acquired a wife and two kids.

We moved from NH to upstate New York right before my third was born. I loved New England, but the pay was just too low. When my kids were older I went back and took a Masters in Elementary Ed at SUNY, Cortland.

Taught for most of my teaching career (40 yrs.) at the New York State School for the Deaf. I taught art, photography, screen printing, and offset camera photography.

I have been an avid photographer since grade school. After moving to New York I began teaching photography at night school at a local college. I took courses in photography, art and media production to the tune of 60 more graduate hours. I also ran a wedding/portrait business for about twenty years then switched to an architectural photography business for seven years.

When I was a kid and we had a vacation we would always come back to Utica to visit the family. I used to stay at my aunt's house which was across the street from a big cemetery. I used to play there all the time. Over time I became fascinated by the art people use to decorate graves and cemeteries. My present art specialty for study is funerary art. I joined an organization, The Association for Gravestone Studies, and began pursuing this reading in earnest in 1991. I closed the business and have concentrated on photographing gravestones and cemeteries for our organization archives.

Weathering, vandalism, and theft are taking a terrible toll on some really lovely art so we are trying to document as much as possible.

I retired from teaching this year and can now concentrate on my two passions - photography and cemeteries. 

I write and lecture on funerary art and the history of gravestones in America. This keeps me out of my wife's hair.

My kids have also given me seven grandchildren.

Six of them live right here in Rome which is great. I wish they all did. Rome is right in the center of New York. Absolutely beautiful country and we have two wonderful seasons, Winter and July 27th.

The main source of income here is the Holstein cow and some grubby factories. But the scenery is gorgeous.

That's me in a nutshell.