Customer Reviews

Hugh Morton's North Carolina

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2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I am so happy that Hugh Morton decided to share his photos with North Carolina and the rest of the world. This book is a true gem and records and reflects a history of a proud people and state.

As one might expect, the pictures far surpass the stories... This book celebrates all things Tar Heel.

Destined to become a classic, Hugh Morton has captured the true essence of North Carolina. He includes the physically beautiful and the rich endowment of people the state has been blessed with. Chronologically, it covers an extensive period of time and mixes color with black and white photography. An excellent selection for the native North Carolinian or someone who has visited and was awestruck by its beauty, from the Blue Ridge Mountains to the Outer Banks.

Stunning photographs of a beautiful state and it's wonderful flora and fauna.

I gave this book to my Brother and Sister in law for Christmas. They are with the State Department therefore they are stationed in countries all over the world. In each country they have lived in they have a book to remember their time there. They originally hail from North Carolina, so when I saw this book I knew it was the perfect gift. I was correct! They love seeing all the places they remember, and sharing those memories with their daughter who has never been "home" to North Carolina. The photos are wonderful. The book is not an oversized coffee table book, but one you can store in a book shelf or on that coffee table. They can't stop thanking us for the book and the memories that it has brought to them.

I learned a valuable lesson with the purchase of this book....go to a bookstore and see the book first. We love North Carolina. I purchased the book for a family member who is from there but is currently living in California. Though there were some pictures that reminded her of her childhood, it seemed more of a retro look at North Carolina. I was disappointed that there weren't very many contemporary photos, very little of the Outer Banks. Hugh seemed stuck on Grandfather Mountain, then I found the following information on website: http://www.grandfather.com/about/history.php....................."In 1952, Hugh MacRae Morton inherited Grandfather Mountain from his grandfather Hugh MacRae. He immediately widened the road to two lanes and extended it to the summit where he built the Mile High Swinging Bridge. In 1968, Morton purchased one male and one female black bear with the intention of letting them loose into the wild. The female bear, named Mildred, refused to revert to the wild and Grandfather Mountain was required to recapture her and keep her enclosed for her own safety. At first, Mildred met the public at a roadside amphitheater four times every day. Then, in 1973, a beautiful Environmental Habitat was built for Mildred and her family." No wonder. There must be a better book I could have chosen for those that miss their home state of North Carolina.

Hugh Morton's book portrays a North Carolina that is decidedly "vanilla" in its image. "Prosaic" is the choice word in the other review. I call it profoundly narrow and racist. In the year 2003 there is no excuse for this book, especially from a publisher with the caliber of University of North Carolina Press. Morton was supposedly "on the scene" photographing the "historic moments" of the past sixty years of the state. Funny how almost all the images and events captured contain only white people.

In the People section there are literally a thousand or more persons in all the individual and group shots. There are, culled from these, a paltry 29 images with Blacks - and this count only by scraping them from the backgrounds in some cases for even the fuzziest representation of their place in the "history" of the state. There are, to his credit, three Blacks appearing at center-stage including Louis Armstrong. However in none of the photos is there to be found a Black woman (except two fuzzy "possibilities" appearing in the background to many whites) - arguably the group upon which much of the state owes it greatness to for supporting others on its trip to greatness, no matter the burden. Oh, and it should be pointed out that of the 29 images of Blacks *twenty three* of them appear as basketball players. Clearly, in Hugh Morton's lens anyways, Black men in North Carolina have contributed most to that history of the past 60 years by doing what they do best - shooting hoops for the Tar Heels. Give me a break....

While it is true that a sum of many experiences and images of many photographers will make up a whole picture of a state, or even a nation, in 2003 this kind of myopic representation - particularly in a state where race has been (and continues to be) such a contentious issue - is not acceptable. In the twenty-first century there is no excuse for such poor judgment where an entire piece of a state's history is left out, erased or "made fuzzy" in the background of a dominant foreground of white hegemony. Publishers are well aware of the politics of representation in media and press these days and UNC Chapel Hill Press is no exception and should be ashamed to be behind such a work: Mr. Morton clearly needs to work on his "black and white" photography some more....