Memory: Balloon Festival

In 1991, near the start of my professional journalistic career, I was a reporter, writer, and photographer for the Olean Times Herald, a daily newspaper in upstate New York. I was based in our bureau in Wellsville, New York. One Saturday morning, I was assigned to take photographs starting at 5 a.m. of a famous hot-air balloon festival in Wellsville. I shot the photos and then drove west 32 miles to Olean because I had to get the film there by 9 a.m. for that afternoon's edition. (This was before digital cameras.) While I got a speeding ticket, I was still able to get the film there at 8:30 a.m. I was quite thrilled that a few of my (color) photos appeared on the front page of the entertainment section of the newspaper.

I came very close to going up in a balloon that day. As per Times Herald tradition, one of the two Wellsville-based reporters would go up in a balloon and the other would take photographs. I lost the coin toss, but it worked out well. She went up in the balloon, which is what she wanted, and I got my photos published in a daily newspaper, which is what I wanted.