In August 2007 my good friend, Ebenezer Baldwin Bowles asked me if I would furnish a “Picture of the Week” to his newly retooled site, corndancer dot com. There was never any doubt that I would do it, but I told him at the time I that I would take a trip through the site and let him know. Call it due diligence or plain cussedness, but I quickly agreed. It seemed like the right thing to do. I had provided some pictures and verbiage to Eb for earlier permutations of the site with good experience. When it comes to web sites, Eb is a string saver. All of the earlier posts are still on the site.
I selected the first picture and sent it to Eb. After I sent it, it occurred to me that there was story behind the picture. In fact, there is a story behind every picture. More often than not, the stories are piqued by questions the picture raises. This was certainly the case in the first post. Given that most of us are curious creatures, this is the tack I chose for that story and many subsequent posts.
So I gave Eb a call and asked him if he wanted the story behind the picture. Unlike me, he showed no reticence or cussedness and immediately informed me that my commentary was welcome. So I composed the tale and sent it to him.
He posted the story and picture on a Sunday night and there was an email from him Monday morning with a link to the Corndancer Picture of the Week. I proceeded to forward the link to a few friends and did the same thing the next week. I began to get some positive feedback.
Spurred by this encouragement, I decided to create a list of recipients for the Monday morning links and used the subject line “Weekly Grist for the Eyes and Mind.” November 29, 2009 marks the 120th Corndancer Picture of the Week and attendant Weekly Grist email. In that time, we have missed one week posting new content. And that was my doing. My day job and the devil made me do it. This blog is now hit by 800 to 1,000 unique visitors per month. The Corndancer Photo of the Week usually racks up a few more unique visitors monthly. We are honored by your attention.
Readers are forwarding the weekly link to their friends and now Weekly Grist read by several hundred people around the globe each week. For that I am grateful. If you or any of your friends want to be added to the Weekly Grist distribution list, send me an email and I will make the addition. Know that this list is only for distribution of the link. I send to an “undisclosed list.” I will never provide this list to anyone else, I respect your privacy.
Eb is a gifted writer with an imagination in size and strength comparable to the Australian outback. He does a few edits on each story. He also writes a number of the headlines when my imagination fails to come up with one. He wrote the first headline for the first post. It was and is good. See pictures and learn more about Ebenezer here.
Thanks,
Joe Dempsey
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