The welder
If only the lines and scars on his hands could talk. Underneath the oil and dirt a diary of 43 years of lines would tell quite a story. Stories of hard work would be the easiest to see but after talking to Hartford Cooper for awhile earlier this fall those stories would just be the beginning.
Hartford Cooper pauses for a portrait in his rural welding shop.
Cooper, a long time fixture of Nodaway, IA, has owned a repair and welding shop off of Birch Avenue for over 30 years. The 78 year-old has welded a variety of projects during his 43 year career.
His tool of choice and an irreplaceable tool for his business is a Lincoln Motor Generator. The now antique generator from the late 60's still provides stick and wire welding after many decades of service for Cooper.
When I met Cooper he was working on repairing the gears of an old feed wagon. The project took all of his focus and dexterity to line the gears up properly to make the wagon work again. He told me that most of his work over the years has come from area farm repairs but more and more of his time is spent repairing commercial garbage bins. The bins rust through over time and Cooper uses his years of experience to replace the bottoms with new steel sheets.
For more than two decades, Joseph L. Murphy has had the pleasure of meeting and connecting with people from all walks of life through photography. He has photographed presidents and heads of state, traversed the winding alleyways of the Fes Medina in Morocco, photographed the sprawling countryside and people that make up Argentina and covered events that have defined the U.S. Most recently, Murphy’s travels have taken him to Cambodia, Mexico, China, Vietnam and Ecuador.
He has spent the past 20 years specializing in agriculture photography for multiple organizations, publications and marketing projects.
A graduate of the University of Iowa, Murphy determined at an early age that his love of photography would shape his vision for life.