Grandfather Leo Howard Oswald

I'm in the final stages of designing a photo book of my Grandfather's WWII photos.  I am so in love with this book!!  When my Grandfather took these photographs and wrote their significance on the photo backs before sending them home, I don't think he ever imagined that he would, in the year 2010, have written his own book!  This photo book is penned in his own hand.

There was minimal photo editing involved.  I didn't want to do any restoration.  The distress of the photos helps to tell Grandfather's story of long ago!  Unfortunately, the deckle edges of most of the photographs had to be cropped out.  I tried to work with them, but no matter what I tried, the bed of the scanner was impossible to minimize against the black background.  The handwriting on the back of the photographs required quite a bit of editing.  Magic eraser made it a breeze, but still, it was necessary to enlarge to the point of pixels in order to remove as much of the photo paper as possible to allow the handwriting to overlay the photographs and black background and still maintain legibility.  There is no added text, other than the text that my Grandfather wrote on the back of his photographs.

The title of the book came into being while I was working with a spread of two photographs of my Grandfather.  On the backs of these photographs he wrote  "Just me." and signed his name "Curlie."  On the back of the second, he wrote "Just me again." and signed his name "Howard."  As I tried to imagine how he must have felt while entitling the photos, in the middle of a war so far away from family and his "honey," with all of his thoughts towards home, I was struck by his modest proclamation of "Just me."  I imagined the excitement of loved ones getting his letters with the photographs and how they must have been shown to everyone back home!  And I began to imagine all of his posterity today who will soon be able to own his book, and how excited we will be, and how we will likely show these photos to everyone who will care to see!!  So my Grandfather's modest "Just Me" is what it is to be entitled, as this is just his story!

As I've gone through these photographs, I feel like I know my Grandfather a little bit more!  I'm especially in awe and grateful to him for his sacrifice in serving our country.