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M. Lewis Kennedy
M. Lewis Kennedy is a Birmingham-based photographer who has been creating images that provide lasting value for his Clients for over twenty-two years. Whether captured digitally or on the highly advanced film stocks of today, Lewis’ artistic interpretations are reproduction grade images that graphically illustrate his Client’s services, products and visions.
Lewis Kennedy has been primarily shooting images of the "built environment" for the last ten years. His typical Clients are Designers, Architects, Interior Designers and Manufacturers.
"Photography is my passion as well as my career. I look forward to the discoveries and knowledge gained as I apply my energy and skills to creating visual solutions for my Client’s image needs."
Lewis is also always stressing the importance of being aware of one’s surroundings and appreciating the beauty and excitement that can be found almost anywhere. By slowing-down and taking a fresh look at the many things in our environment that we take for granted one can find design, history, suspense and intrigue.
Lewis especially likes to visit old industrial sites and railroad reserves to get a sense of the operations and energy that flowed when these entities were in full use and also to appreciate the craftsmanship and construction values of the day. An amateur industrial archeologist you might call him.
Some of his commercial work can be viewed at his website at http://www.mlewiskennedy.com
Click on any of the images below to view a larger image.
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The WofA Shops coal chute was considered one of the most impressive in the southeast. Built in 1913 by Roberts & Schaefer Company of Chicago, only the massive reinforced concrete skeleton of the chute remains. It is, however, an imposing and signature feature of the Shops landscape, and our railpark concept places an interpretive theater at the foot of this magnificent 60-foot high structure.
Credit: M. Lewis Kennedy |
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Now open to the Alabama sky, coal once slipped through this aperture by the ton. It fell into bins that measured coal for tenders attached to West Point Route and Central of Georgia steam locomotives.
Credit: M. Lewis Kennedy |
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Old Alabama Rails Vice-President, the Rev. Mark E. Waldo, Sr., considers what is to come with railpark plans in hand.
Credit: M. Lewis Kennedy |
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At this southeast end of the Paint Shop, oils, stencils and paints were stored for use. The Paint Shop was completed in 1901 and included within its premises a lab for testing the water used in West Point Route steam locomotives and for determining what additives would best prevent scaling and deposits in their boilers.
Credit: M. Lewis Kennedy |
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This area and the area through the open door visible at the far end of the room housed the Shops’ water laboratory in the Paint Shop building.
Credit: M. Lewis Kennedy |
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Only two what used to be ten of these vents remain on the roof of the Paint Shop. This roof was once supported by twelve splendid trusses that were classic examples of the transitional technology that combined massive timbers, iron rods, and cast iron rosettes. Old Alabama Rails hopes to reconstruct this building with the aid of the Timber Framer’s Guild of America.
Credit: M. Lewis Kennedy |
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These are mangled remains of some of the Paint Shop’s heavy timber trusses.
Credit: M. Lewis Kennedy |
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No more light shed from here.
Credit: M. Lewis Kennedy |
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The steel trusses of the Planing Mill and Pattern Shops, built in 1908, were a step up in structural endurance from the 1901 Paint Shop. Though the roofing is almost completely gone, this building is essentially sound. On this second floor of the building, skilled craftsmen created foundry patterns, stained glass windows, and upholstered passenger car seats.
Credit: M. Lewis Kennedy |
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Another view of the Planing Mill’s steel trusses.
Credit: M. Lewis Kennedy |
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In the 437’-long car shed, with hundreds of skylights in its original 1906 roof, activities ranged from passenger and freight car rebuilding (and painting at the far end of this photograph in the Paint Shop), to wreck salvage, to middle-of-the-night Pullman car repair (with passengers still sleeping aboard!). The shed has four tracks in a brick floor and is in good condition.
Credit: M. Lewis Kennedy |
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Abstract photograph of nails in old wood.
Credit: M. Lewis Kennedy |
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Abstract photograph of bubbles in spilled concrete.
Credit: M. Lewis Kennedy |
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