Page 12 - NyghtVision Magazine Volume 4 #1

O. Winston Link Museum

Even among photographers, the name "O. Winston Link" isn't well known. Between 1955 and Born in Brooklyn in 1914, Link died in 2001, just before the end of another world - film photog-
1960, Link assumed the task of documenting the end of an era - the last stream-driven locomotives in use raphy. Never having worked with film, I have had a passing knowledge at best of what the life of a film
in the United States were coming off line. Their departure would mark the end of an era. The Norfolk and photographer must have been like. There in the museum, with his images and cameras side by side, I
Western Railroad, which called Roanoke, Virginia, home had decided that the old steam engines were understood how complex and difficult it was for him to create such magnificent images.
just too inefficient. So Link roamed the entire rail system documenting the people, places, and railroad The museum has many of Link's cameras, his darkroom, and other gear he used. Given that there
gear used by the company. were no strobes when Link was working, he had to go to great lengths to light the scenes he was capturing.
Much of Link's work can be found at a special museum housed in Roanoke Visitor's Center. The As the lead photo in this essay shows, each of Link's lights were comprised of flash bulbs. Every time he
images, some of which can be seen here, are breathtaking. Overlooking the train tracks, the collection created an image, each and every bulb had to be replaced. If I don't like an image I have just created, in a
begins with a stunning, room long, photograph (see 2) of a steam locomotive, complete with its crew. matter of seconds, I can create another. And more, for those of us who use strobes, adjusting the intensity
The image, nearly life-size, is both captivating and overwhelming. For those of us who never new these of light is little more than adjusting a dial. Link never had that option. Every light had to be placed pre-
hulking machines, we have no measure of their grandeur, until we stand before a image like this. Looking cisely and every image he created required that he painstakingly calculate the amount of light required.
at a train moving coal over an expansive bridge reminded me just how much our world has changed. (see Amazing.
1) Having been through many of the small towns that drew their life from the steam engine and coal, I My friend, Jim Hoyle, and I were the only people in the museum. It was a Sunday afternoon and I
now understand more deeply the impact of the death of this world has had on so many lives. was surprised that we were the only ones there. I was saddened.

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