I often refer to this sequence of images as my best hour and a half in photography. Here’s why.

Hoy Shelton Family Hanging Tobacco, Hopewell, Madison County, NC 1983.
—from *Sodom Laurel Album*

I had spent the better part of this particular Saturday in Hot Springs ostensibly photographing a festival that proved to be a bust, yielding no images of interest. It was deflating and I left feeling depressed over the wasted time. I smoked a joint on my drive back to Big Pine hoping to ease my frustration when I spotted a group of people unloading tobacco into a barn set above the roadway. I didn’t know the people, but I stopped, thinking I might salvage something of the day. They were the Hoy Shelton family and a couple of their neighbors.

I introduced myself, told them where I lived, and my interest in photographing them as they hung their tobacco crop. We knew people in common, which eased their initial discomfort, and they agreed to let me make pictures. But as I pulled out my cameras, everyone stopped working and began posing. I thought, geez, this is going to be worse than the day in Hot Springs. Because I had worked a lot of tobacco during my time in the county I thought I might as well help so I put my cameras down and began hauling the heavy, tobacco-laden sticks of burley into the barn.

Everyone relaxed with my willingness to work. We talked, told stories of people we knew, took a break and shared cigarettes and water. We laughed and joked and teased and sweated as one. The change was immediate and when the next truckload arrived, I picked up my cameras again and everyone ignored me.

Now, I say this was my best hour and a half in photography partially because of how the time came about. The shared labor opened a door and taught me a valuable lesson about trust and acceptance and what it means to be a part of other’s lives, even if just for a brief moment.

I’ve long thought photographs should be believable and speak clearly about the subject of the image. In these pictures we see an essential part of Madison County’s history—how burley tobacco served to keep thousands of small subsistence farmers on their land. We see something of the hard work itself, the dirt and dust, and what people do to make a crop. The pictures also reflect the importance of family, and community, and the land itself. The images offer factual evidence.

But I’ve also thought photographs should be a reflection of the photographer himself—his concerns, his interests, his instincts. The pictures have eerily religious overtones for me. It begins with the darkness, the soft late-evening light that speaks of quiet and invites you to look closely. The shrouds, crosses, and the gift of the dust angel takes me to the religious teachings of my youth. And the family—holy, saintly, together, everyone helping, cleansed by hard work, practicing the art of tobacco, Madison County’s economic religion.

Latino Farmworker cutting tobacco, Upper Brush Creek, Madison County, NC 1993.

The growing season is winding down and the tobacco leaves are big and heavy with resin. It’s time to cut. Long days in the hot sun, cutting stalk after stalk, spudding them on sticks, and leaving them in the field to dry for a few days before moving them into the barn for curing.

I have a memory of this — working with friends and neighbors, where, at the end of the day, your hands were black and sticky with tar and your back aching from lifting the plants. For me, despite the grueling work, it was an almost joyful time. The sense of community, the sharing of stories, the understanding I was learning valuable lessons about this place. Perhaps most importantly, I was learning I was capable of doing, and becoming good at, this hard, dirty work that my body had no experience doing.

I wouldn’t trade this experience for anything. It provided a lifetime bond with my immediate neighbors and the community as a whole. My willingness to work, to get dirty, to try something new, to be available when asked, built trust, which has proved to be the single most important element of my photography and writing. So, while tobacco continues to be one of the leading causes of death in our country, I realize it brought life to hundreds of rural communities in the mountain south. And provided this photographer the opportunity to become part of a place I now call home.

Pictures & Words