Last year, The Reno News & Review commissioned me to create a series of photos based on classic American literature – to be specific, the book ‘Roughing It’ by Mark Twain. This was an incredibly challenging photo series to produce, but I met some fascinating people along the way and am looking forward to doing more work with a strong historical basis.
There are 10 images in this series, not including the cover shot. I’ll be doing a separate blog post for each of them, and will include quotes about the Twain characters that they are based upon. We’ll start with the cover image portrayed below. This is McAvoy Lane, renowned Twain impersonator. He’s sitting at Twain’s actual desk in the old Territorial Enterprise office in Virginia City. Twain worked there as a reporter for quite some time. It was quite an experience to watch history come to life right before me. If you’re ever in Virginia City, I suggest visiting the Territorial Enterprise Museum (where this was photographed) and taking the tour.