Gary Walts had many occasions to photograph his father, Aubrey Guy Walts, who supported a family of twelve by working as a machinist for the New Jersey National Guard. In particular, Gary documented his father’s deteriorating mental health over a two-year period in the mideighties. When Aubrey Walts took his own life in 1987, Gary filed away the undeveloped negatives and didn’t retrieve them until ten years later, after a colleague’s death brought back memories.
Gary’s brother Bruce appears in several of the pictures here, all but one of which are being published for the first time. The youngest of ten children, Bruce was still living at home when their father died. “He had a special relationship with Dad,” Gary writes. “He sort of watched over him.”
— Ed.
The photographs from this selection are available as a PDF only. Click here to download.
