Yankeetown by Tom Leininger
I realized photographs are visual memories when I discovered I have few photographs of the town I grew up in. I returned to Elmira, New York to document certain places that held memories for me.
Like most people of my generation, growing up in the late 1970s and early 1980s meant being lugged from store to store for the family supplies. There were a couple of department stores, but not like the big box stores of today. This was the time before the corporate shopping experience.
The pictures hint at a common story, corporations move in, downtown dries up, photographer returns and records traces of the past. These photographs are memories described in the present tense. It is also a comment on how the town and I have both progressed.
Tom Leininger is a Denton, TX based photographer and educator.
To view more of Tom's work, please visit his website.
