About Feeling Grateful

(Fieldon, IL) Mark Angel holds the only thing he found that was usable the morning after his home burned on November 13, 2012 in rural Jersey county Illinois.  The CD with kindergarten images of his son who is now in fifth grade was found in a case and covered with water and debris.  The gloves and jacket he is wearing are borrowed as everything the family owned was destroyed in the fire that kept restarting and kept the local volunteer fire department busy most of the night.

I live in a very rural part of southern Illinois.  It's a great place to live in many ways except that some of the things many take for granted by living in a metropolitan area are lacking in the rural parts of this country.  Fire protection is an issue.  Not only is fire protection an issue, but access to water so that a fire can be extinguished is an issue as well.

While out shopping for new basketball shoes for his son, Mark Angel received a call that his house was fully engulfed in flames.  Someone driving by the house saw the fire and called it in to the authorities, but the result was a total loss of everything the family owned.  If you have never seen what a house fire is capable of, no words, photos or videos can fully describe the aftermath.

It's really no different that what hurricane Sandy did to many along the eastern US coast several weeks ago except that everything is either melted or burned beyond recognition, not washed away.

(Fieldon, IL)  Homeowner Mark Angel talks to an Illinois State Fire Marshal investigator as two of the volunteer firefighters that responded the the fire that destroyed his home the evening before look on. 

With Thanksgiving upon us, we all need to be grateful.  Mark was grateful to at least have one CD of photos of his son. Considering he lives less than one mile from me, I know I have many reasons to feel grateful.

The Easy Shot I Didn't Take

(Greene County, IL USA) A view of the intersection of US Highway 67 and Kane Road looking north with signs for the Kane American Legion, a church, politicians and realtors.

As I got ready to turn onto Kane Road, I looked around and thought what a pretty day this is for early in February.  We have had a lot of days like that this winter, but where I was headed it wasn't so nice.  It's not so nice for any number of reasons, but I suppose number one on the list of many is that just a few days before a mother and her child had died in a house fire.   The night it happened I had just returned from Cedar Rapids in enough time to shoot a basketball game at a local high school and then went home with hundreds of images to edit.  I didn't know about the fire until the next morning.  It was on the local morning news.  I knew sooner or later I'd probably need to try and get something related to the fire.

The oil and chip road leading east from US Highway 67 to the rural village of Kane, Illinois.  Kane Cemetery is to the left at the center of the image with the village in the treeline.

When I arrived in Kane, I traveled the streets of the town and finally at the corner of Hinton Street and Hinton Alley, I found the burned out remains of the home.  When I first arrived, it was deserted with no one in sight.  After a few minutes a pickup truck arrived and the occupants got out and started talking to a person who lived close to the burned out house.

There was a younger man there with what I assume was his son.  He saw me with a camera and started toward me, glaring at my media credentials hanging around my neck. He walked away and took his son to the cross with the pile of stuffed animals.  I watch from behind them as he kneels down with his young son, holding him ever so close.  It was from a photographer's view a great moment.  An easy shot that I didn't make.  It was such a personal moment for them that I couldn't do it.  I had them framed in the viewfinder but got up and walked to my car.

(Kane, IL) The burned out remains of the home where Breanne Ferguson and daughter, Tristan Stark lost their lives in a house fire on January 25, 2012.  Friends and family created a makeshift memorial at the foot of the "Dead End" street sign.

Rather than intrude into the lives of two grieving people, I stopped by the Kane Cemetery and found the fresh graves.  The digging equipment tracks are still visible as I walked to the spot.  Side by side, mother and child.  Not so far away, across an open field from the town with the burned out house.

(Kane, IL) The graves of 28-year- old Breanne Ferguson and her daughter, 10-year-old Tristan Stark.  Both died in a house fire in the small rural village of Kane.  The village is visible across the field behind the graves.