Simply put.  Everyone I knew, in one way or another, worked for the late great Eastman Kodak Company. 

Photography was around me all the time.  Even my great-grandmother as a girl of 15, was taking photographs a hundred years ago in 1908.  Photographs I still have and cherish.

It is no wonder, I went where I went.

I got my first camera when I was nine, and had my own darkroom later that year. And by the time I was a Junior in High School I had conceived, photographed, directed and produced a 45 minute "movie-yearbook" combining 16mm, Super-8 and thousands of images projected on three screens to a rock soundtrack.

My darkroom is now replaced with Photoshop, there are times I still miss the smell of developer, stop bath and fixer... but not so much that I'd ever go back.

The only film camera I still own is a classic mahogony 8x10 Deardorf, complete with the black cape and sheet film holders.