Krug: Peasley has seen progress through his own lens

Don Peasley poses for a picture at the Woodstock Opera House. (Danielle Guerra photo)

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>> Watch video of conversation with Peasley

I’ve always admired Don Peasley’s photography. And, to be perfectly frank, his longevity.

Take one look at his work, and you see a genuineness and authenticity. His photos are honest. His images feature people you know as you would like to know them. His environmental portraits – for example, an image of a winding road that juts past a old barn – leaves you with the feeling that you are there. Or, perhaps as important, that you were there.

There is a documentary quality to his work that stems from an earnest approach to capture people and places as they are.

For more than 60 years, Peasley has photographed people of all kinds in McHenry County. Rich and poor. Famous and familiar. Young and old.

He isn’t quite sure how many frames he has captured. And who would count? But his collection of photographs is well into the thousands. Without argument, no other person has documented more of the growth and change of McHenry County through photography than Peasley.

When our editors were working through the potential topics for our 2009 progress section, they ultimately settled on the concept of “My McHenry County.” The thought was that we would let people from McHenry County offer their personal views of their hometown, and through their own words.

It was after they had determined the theme that I thought of Peasley. I always had wanted to sit down with Peasley and talk to him about his work. I also wanted to share that story with our readers.

As a companion to our 2009 progress edition that appears today in print, Danielle Guerra has produced a video featuring Peasley and I having a conversation about his work at the Woodstock Opera House.

Many of the photos from his collection have been taken there, and I thought it would be a fitting backdrop for a chat about his career, his photography and some of his favorite images that span seven decades in McHenry County. In fact, we probably could have done an hours-long documentary on it all. But we condensed out conversation to the dozen or so images that he most fondly recalls.

I will fondly remember the chance to sit with him for a very long time.

I invite you to come and see Don and learn more about his work. Please join us by clicking to NWHerald.com/mymchenrycounty.

• Chris Krug is general manager and executive editor of the Northwest Herald. Contact Chris by calling 815-459-4122, or via e-mail at ckrug@nwherald.com.