Inside Iowa State: Iowa State University

INSIDE IOWA STATE
June 14, 2002

Here's Bob

Bob Elbert on top of Molecular Biology building

ISU photographer Bob Elbert got over his fear of heights a long time ago -- out of necessity. Photo by Grant Steinfeldt.

by Linda Charles
He has crawled under bushes, straddled girders, waded through streams, peered through cupolas, dodged cow pies and dangled from roof tops -- all in the name of the job.

He's Bob Elbert, Iowa State's photographer and the man behind the lens in Inside's "Where's Bob?" The series, which challenges readers to identify where Elbert has shot his photos, has made him "a household name, or at least a campus name," Elbert admits.

"It's amazing. When I go on a shoot, people will say, 'Guess we know where you've been!'" he said. "When we first started doing the series, I thought, 'How many places can we do?' I thought maybe it would last six months."

Six years later, he's still finding mystery spots on campus to photograph.

"I run into people who say, 'I've been on campus for 20 years and you can't fool me.' Others say they never know where the photo was taken," Elbert said.

Something to do
As a child growing up in Algona, Elbert had no interest in shooting pictures. It wasn't until he joined the Navy that he started taking photographs, one of which almost got him abandoned in Vietnam.

After boot camp, he was sent to Milford, Tenn., to attend electronics school. It was there that Elbert took up photography "for lack of something better to do."

In his off time, he would buy a roll of film and "shoot on the way over to the darkroom to have something to develop." Elbert is the first to admit his photos weren't art. "I'd shoot fire hydrants, people walking by."

Art or not, he was hooked. While serving with a patrol squadron at Sangley Point in the Philippines, he was assigned to a routine surveillance flight with orders to pick up a passenger at the Naval base in Cam Ranh Bay, Vietnam, before proceeding to Utapao, Thailand.

"I wanted to get a picture to show I was in Vietnam," Elbert said. Camera in tow, he wandered off. When he came back to the airstrip, the plane already was taxiing down the runway. Panicked, Elbert stood in front of the plane waving his hands. The plane rolled to a stop and the crew dropped a knotted rope ladder.

"I'd never climbed one of those before, but I went right up," Elbert said.

Equipment confiscated
Six months before he got out of the Navy, Elbert married his hometown sweetheart, Sue. After his tour of duty, Elbert headed home, where he worked for his father in a "gas station-short order-beer tavern" for a while before heading to Hawkeye Institute of Technology in Waterloo to study photography.

It was there that Elbert took his favorite photograph to date -- a character study of his father. The photo won a Professional Photographers of Iowa student award.

His first job was as news photographer on the Fairfield Daily Ledger. Next, he became a photo editor for the American Soybean Association in St. Louis, where he won a number of top agricultural photo awards.

He traveled a lot for the association, shooting soybeans across the nation and overseas. Once, en route from Singapore to Jakarta, Indonesia, his equipment was confiscated. Officials told him they were worried he was going to shoot pornographic photos. In reality, Elbert said, they wanted money. Eventually, he was allowed to proceed, billfold still intact.

During his travels, exotic foods showed up on the plate of the photographer who had grown up on Iowa-style pork chops and mashed potatoes. One such dish was a plate of pigeon heads, beaks attached. He passed.

"I never worry about insulting people," Elbert said. "If it doesn't look good to me, I'm not going to eat it."

Hold your nose
Elbert probably still would be in St. Louis if the American Soybean Association hadn't been downsized. He spent about a year and a half freelancing in St. Louis ("I didn't like freelancing; it's too feast-or-famine") and then a photographer position opened at Iowa State in 1995.

Some of the things he is asked to photograph baffle him, like the art project he had to shoot shortly after he arrived on campus. A woman showed up with a "quilt" made of plastic pouches. In each pouch was rotting fruit.

"It was soooooooooo pungent!" Elbert said. "I hadn't shot a lot of art then. I just didn't understand it. I thought, 'Someone is spending a lot of money on this (shoot)' and I just couldn't understand why. A thousand words couldn't explain the smell. Now, though, nothing amazes me."

Feeding time Although Elbert claims, "I'm a dull guy," a stop by his office proves otherwise. Greeting visitors is a sign on the door window that says, "Please do not tap on the glass, especially during feeding times."

His office is filled with photographic collectibles. "Anything with a camera or camera advertising on it, I'll collect," Elbert said. His family room at his Nevada home also is filled with his "junk."

"One of my favorite pastimes is to nose through antique, thrift and junk shops looking for photo collectibles, bargains and weird stuff I have to have," he said. That makes a good fit with another favorite pastime: driving around looking for interesting photos in Iowa's small towns and rural areas. He recently finished a series of photos of old grist mills.

He also has used a lot of film on his three children. "My kids knew when I said I was going to take a picture, it meant two to four rolls of film," Elbert said. During his off hours, when he isn't freelancing, he's in his vegetable garden or in the kitchen (often making salsa from garden ingredients). Then there's eBay, the online shopping site.

"I can easily spend a couple of hours checking out the collectible stuff they have on auction any given day," he said.

Got an idea for "Where's Bob?"
Send ideas for "Where's Bob?" locations to belbert@iastate.edu.