Ansel Adams Read Online Free PDF Page B

thought that the little boy in Ansel, who took up a healthy portion of the man, might enjoy a few hours there as we waited usually for hours between press checks. Ansel cautiously agreed, while expressing concern that he might not be up to walking very far.
    I called to arrange for a wheelchair, and when we arrived, Mickey Mouse himself was there to greet us. After the de rigueur publicity photos were taken (by now I was feeling terrible about what I had done: Ansel forced to pose with Mickey was not a pretty sight), we scooted off. Because he had been recognized, Ansel refused the wheelchair, only adding to my guilt.
    We trooped through the Haunted House and experienced the Pirates of the Caribbean. Ansel adored the holograms in the former, and as we swooped down a water chute in the latter venue, he laughed so hard that he caught a mouthful of water. I could only pray that he wouldn’t have a heart attack. Months later, when asked about this visit, Ansel was scornful of Disneyland, but while we were on those rides, he loved it.
    Other legitimate excuses for a needed break or a change of scenery were provided by offers of honorary degrees (requiring a personal appearance) or book signings—events that gave Ansel the maximum pleasure with the minimum physical strain. How wonderful it was for him when at Harvard on June 4, 1981, although wearing a mortarboard rather than a Stetson, Ansel was instantly recognized by the students, who rose to their feet and began clapping, stomping, and cheering. Ansel’s eyes, unaccustomed throughout his entire life to emotional expression, reddened with the effort needed to fight back tears. At the luncheon following the awards, the great diva Leontyne Price, likewise the recipient of an honorary degree, got up on her chair and sang “America the Beautiful” a cappella, with such conviction and perfection as to make the hair on the nape of Ansel’s neck stand on end. So many great artists are unable to enjoy fame in their lifetime; happily, this was not the case for Ansel Adams.
    Ansel was unfailingly kind to everyone who showed up at his book signings. Often there would be hundreds of people in line, winding around blocks and up and down stairs, always to the astonishment of the bookstore or museum, which usually ran out of books early even though we had done our best to prepare the staff. Although most signings were scheduled to run for only two hours, we often stayed four to get to the end of the line, and even then it was not always possible to accommodate everyone. In 1982, at San Francisco’s Academy of Sciences, a group of young people camped out all night in sleeping bags in front of the door just to be first in line. Ansel basked in this rock star–style popularity.
    I coordinated the signings and then stood at Ansel’s side as he sat at a table, a special pen filled with permanent ink in hand. After first advising each autographee that Ansel could not personalize the inscription—information that was met with crestfallen faces and more than a little protest—I would open each book to the particular page that Ansel had decided was the most appropriate so as not to transgress upon the design. Only one specific page would do, and it was not always the title page. I would then return it to the person, who was often by now relating to Ansel in rapid fire (the line was pressing behind) how he had changed his or her life, or reminding him that they had once met on some Sierra trail, or pleading, “Please look at my photographs!” (pulled out from under an arm and placed with a flourish under Ansel’s nose). It was rejuvenating for Ansel to feel the affection that so many people had for him and his work.
    In 1981, the Museum Set project was still dragging on. Ansel was supposed to have completed 110 or so sixteen-by-twenty-inch prints of each of the basic ten images, as well as thirty-five to fifty each of the sixty variables, plus ten of Surf Sequence. This added up to a total