J. Jason Lazarus Blog

Those that know anything about me knows how much I love creepy, old, abandoned places - and for the last five years or so, I’ve done quite a bit of exploration - some of it, albeit, a bit on the questionable side of legality.  I haven’t gone so far to cross barb-wired fences or bring boltcutters along for those pesky locks, but I have been known to ignore some questionable signs suggesting “private property”.  It was seemingly far too difficult to do it the completely legal way by determining who the landowner was and persuing their permission through conventional means - Lord knows, Department of Natural Resources as well as the Bureau of Land Management can only rarely actually tell me who owns a plot of land that I wish to venture on.  So much of the local land is divvied into vague land trusts and those parts that are owned by private hands directly have fairly vague property lines due to the absurd lack of resolution in any of the DNR’s or BLM’s records.  As an aside - the admins at BLM are snotty, unhelpful lackies.

There also ends up being the awkward situation of mining rights versus property rights - far too many of the miners up here think that their subsurface rights extend to people walking through “their” land and all personal knowledge that I have hints at that being incorrect.  Why are these seemingly minute issues a big problem for me?  Because unlike the lower 48, Fairbanks being the boomtown that it is, hasn’t cared enough to publically allow access to some of its most treasured historical relics - most have been in private hands for years.  Our history is literally rotting behind the proverbial old man in a rocking chair on his front porch with a gun.  I’ve made it my mission to photograph whats left before it’s all gone.

Already access to several excellent examples of Fairbanks Mining past has been further restricted - Cleary Hill Mine now has a active mining operation further up the hill and I’ve had students shooed away from access to this wonderful historical site - as well, the stamp mill on St. Patrick Road (Maybe part of Ryan Lode) now has a “private property” sign on it.  These landowners can’t, no matter how pretty their words may be, convince me that they’re preserving history through “arrested decay” - they’re letting it rot and are letting their need to be private erase any tangible sign of Fairbanks’ true history from the map.

That being said, lately, through several strokes of good luck, I’ve managed to gain access to several prime historical sites the legal way - first with the Polaris Building back a few months ago (thanks be to Jess Hoffmann for her efforts) and now a couple of weeks ago at the old KFAR building off of Farmer’s Loop.  KFAR’s radio station used to be, when it was constructed in the late ’30s by Cap Lathrop’s media empire, about five miles from town on a old bumpy dirt road - the operator lived in an apartment that was part of this art-deco building and thus didn’t have to make a lengthy trip in sub-zero weather much of the year to run the transmitter.

Although there wasn’t much left in the building, it was still nice to be able to go in and capture it before it decays further.  The main equipment room is slowly sinking into the ground due to improper treatment of the surrounding permafrost - half the floor has caved in about two feet.  Much of the husks of the old equipment racks are still there but the bulk of the equipment is long gone due to automation.  The tower seems to still be in operation as the apartment that the operator lived in was locked off with fans and equipment audible inside.  A desk, a few reel-to-reel tapes and scraps of transmitter manuals is all that’s left of, in all the stories I’ve heard, was a gorgeously-built station with mahogony desks lining the entire room.  Sad to see it all fade away but it is nice to capture what remains - perhaps as a testiment for the future - appreciate the past, don’t just let it fade away.

In the past week, I’ve managed to also get some contacts on exploring more of Fairbanks Creek area (including a mining camp!) and have gotten the name of a contact out in the Gilmore area behind the NOAA station - lets hope my charm comes through and that I get access - at this point I’m batting 1000 for doing it the legal way - lets hope and pray that continues!

I can’t tell you how much this 5d is an improvement over my original Digital Rebel. Yes, I understand that I’m stating the obvious at this point but I previously had no concept exactly how much the Rebel with it’s horribly small sensor was gimping my lenses. The glass that I’ve bought for my cameras isn’t exactly on the pricey side but it’s fairly frustrating to buy a wide angle lens and use it as a standard lens for over two years not knowing exactly how great it can be. These photos manage to be a pretty obvious testament to the vast improvement of photos I’m getting out of it now.

You see what I did there? Yes, that was a desperate attempt at making this post seem to be NOT about Aidan or Aidan-related things. Unfortunately, aside from him and his constantly changing list of abilities, life has become pretty docile and predictable - not at all as interesting to talk about than him. He is indeed walking and running everywhere - managing to get into practically everything and is still the cutest kid I’ve ever seen. He’s managed to become quite a bit of a mini-drama king with unfortunately (yet thankfully) so short of temper-tantrums that it’s practically impossible to reinforce better behavior. Yes, Aidan is the master of the three-second temper tantrum. That’s it - it’s done before you actually realize it’s begun. I suppose I shouldn’t complain too much about that but I would like to reinforce better behavior but it’s hard to discipline him for something he isn’t doing anymore - nor was really doing for any elongated amount of time.

He’s starting to talk - doing his coy little routine of perfectly saying one of his “words” - i.e. “Ma”, “Da”,”No”, “Hi” or “Bye” and yet when asked to repeat he smiles widely without ability to repeat his monumental achievement.  That being said, it’s still wonderful to see him slowly progressing.  He’s starting to mimic us with the use of a couple of those words - like walking down the hall yelling “DA!” to try to find me or sternly pointing and saying “No!” at something that we told him not to touch.  Yes, he is, indeed, reinforcing, for himself, what we tell him not to do.  Smart kid, if ya ask me.

From the pictures you can tell we’ve been out and about during the month of May - so much so that I haven’t found much time to blog at all about it.  Due to some unseasonably warm weather, we’ve taken Aidan to Pioneer Park and Weeks Field (pictured) a couple of times as well as had a few friendly get-togethers over at the house.  In particular, in early May we had some friends over for BBQ and Aidan had a blast playing in the yet-to-be-completely-raked-up leaves.  In addition to all this, we did Angel Rocks for our inaugural Summer ‘09 hike.  Here’s to hoping that there’s many more.

Thanks to a coworker’s generous gift of their hand-me-down hiking baby backpack, Angel Rocks was a breeze.  Aidan absolutely loved going out and was amazingly quite calm, if not a bit overenthusiastic, at the prospect of seeing nature.  The overenthusiastic point came when, on fairly rocky and steep terrian, Aidan, whose already bouncing because of the natural movements of me walking up and down rocks and roots, starts bouncing up and down frantically and gleefully.

The second-to-last weekend in May I ran off to Anchorage for a much-needed break from Fairbanks.  As much as I love living where I do, Fairbanks, after a long torturous winter, can manage to grind you down.  I went to Anchorage for the big lights, the breweries, shopping opportunities, and to hang out with Brian - and somewhere in there was a hope to get some photography done.  Trying to scope out an old Nike Missle Base down Arctic Valley Road was my first hope - which was quickly dashed by fairly large warning signs stating that live firing was going on in the area I was hoping to hike in.  Nothing dashes your hopes of photographical excellence more than the potential of being shot at.

The second attempt was with Brian - a quick jaunt down to Girdwood and back past Crow Creek Mine in one of my classic “lets see where this dirt road will take us” trips.  We managed to find an amazing trail that went through the pass toward Eagle River - but after about a mile and a half of hiking on what felt like a trail straight up the pass, we ran into far too much snow and not enough good gear to safely get pass.  I took a few shots but we unfortunately didn’t manage to get to the old mine and stamp mill that is apparently up there.  Another time, I suppose!

Third time was on my way back home - an attempt at hiking in Hatcher’s Pass.  At this point, if you’ve known of my previous photography trips, you know that I have a lustful eye always gazing toward this well-hidden slice of paradise.  Unfortunately, Hatcher’s Pass is playing hard to get - out of the last six times I’ve attempted to go up there, disaster (or something equally as natural) has struck all but two.  This time it managed to be some idiot suped-up racers that thought the winding and trecherous road was a perfect place to race at Noon on a Sunday.  Managing to pile-drive their car into a SUV because they were in the wrong lane coming around a turn, several people ended up hurt (as far as I know not seriously - I pray not!) and closing the road for several hours making it practically impossible for me to shoot and get home the same night - alas, I missed my opportunity again.

The trip was by far not ruined - I had several days worth of fun with Brian, a good friend from my Nerland years at UAF - as well as a nice evening with Curt Merrill, a friend from Conference Housing days and who now works in Atlanta.  Got some shopping done and rested - two things I really needed to do.

Aside from that, the last weekend of May, Deanna’s parents came to visit for a long weekend.  We got our garden started with four square-foot gardening squares (much bigger than one square foot each, mind you) and finally got our kitchen’s potrack installed.  Since then, aside from work and some limited time gaming, we both have been putting quite a few hours in the yard and garden sprucing it all up.  At this point we’ve managed to get Peas, Broccoli, Leeks, Strawberries, Squash, two types of Lettuce, Zuccini and a few herbs planted with more on the docket to plant any day now.  We’ve got Sunflowers up front and just transplanted some Delphiniums, Irises & Ferns from the backyard to the front.  All told, we’re putting much more effort forth this summer than last summer - and it’s making it so much more appealing just to go in the yard and relax!

That’s about it for now - hopefully will manage to update more often in future - no promises, though.  If you’re far too interested in my life for your own good, keep track of my Twitter posts.