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Issue Date: September 10, 2006
Born on 9/11: Life at five
Photographer Stretch Ledford's comments
We wanted to photograph each of the children in this project with a prop that would visually represent their developing personalities. Here is what we chose and why:
Jack Corrales
Jack seems to be about as typical a little boy as there is in the U.S. One of the icons of American boyhood is the Tonka Truck. Jack has several of them, and they seemed to be the perfect props to include in his portrait.
Kaitlyn C. Nguyen
Vivian and Anthony Nguyen told me that their daughter Kaitlyn loves to sing and loves animals. I asked the Nguyens if they could bring Kaitlyn's small karaoke machine and several of her stuffed animals to the shoot, which would take place in the gymnasium of a neighborhood church. When the family walked into the gym, Kaitlyn was carrying a stuffed bear that was nearly as big as she was. Although I immediately decided to photograph her with "Jollie Bear," Kaitlyn was nevertheless kind enough to perform a karaoke duet of "Who Let the Dogs Out" with me after we finished the shoot.
Charlotte McDermott
Charlotte McDermott is a young lady of many interests. During one of our first conversations, Charlotte's mom, Monica, told me that when Charlotte grows up she wants to be an ice skater, a farmer, and a doctor. Unable to think of a way to combine these elements into one cohesive portrait, and knowing that it was likely that Charlotte would learn to ice skate before doing any farming or going to med school, I decided to photograph Charlotte with a pair of skates my assistant had borrowed for the shoot.
Anne-Sophie Labossiere
Anne-Sophie's parents are both physicians. Florence, her mom, told me that Anne-Sophie also wants to become a doctor. Florence and Anne-Sophie arrived at the shoot with Anne-Sophie's toy medical kit, and Florence's real stethoscope, which looked so natural around Anne-Sophie's neck that I decided to use it in the portrait.
Rhett Wombles
Rhett is a huge fan of NASCAR, especially driver Tony Stewart. Rhett's collection of model cars would be too small to photograph and Tony's Chevrolet was unavailable, so we started looking for other options. His dad is the promoter at a dirt track near the family's home, and has an assortment of flags used in auto racing. A checkered flag represents racing even to readers who are not fans, so I decided to photograph Rhett with it.
Anya Cermak
When I asked Michelle Cermack about Anya's interests, she immediately mentioned her daughter's love of reading and her small library of books. Once we placed Anya's books with her in the set, the only difficult thing about the shoot became trying to direct her attention away from the book she was reading and toward the camera.
Photographs by Charles Ledford for USA WEEKEND
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