Throwback Thursday: Memories in My Man Cave

by Skip Cohen

In the original man caves, stories were told through pictures painted on the walls. The pictures told stories, not much different than my own man cave today.  Okay, so I don't really have a man cave, but in one section of my garage is my workbench with all my tools, and on one wall, shelves of memory-makers. 

The memories span a wide range, covering everything from my career in the industry to dive trips and a battle over "gotcha" moments with a group of very special friends. But today's "tour" includes some special highlights:
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• Dean Collins: The "Navel Academy" poster is thanks to my old buddy Dean Collins. That's Dean's daughter, Hannah, being held, and she's in her thirties today.
• Joe Regalbuto: The large print to the right is a present from Joe Regalbuto, who co-starred as "Frank" on Murphy Brown. He's a talented photographer whom I met many years ago at PhotoShop World in Boston. We spotted him on the trade show floor, and somebody dared me to ask him to join us for dinner. So, "Joe, I'm Skip Cohen, and a bunch of us from the industry are going out to dinner tonight, and we need a token celebrity. Do you want to join us?" His answer was perfect: "Only if I can sit next to Julianne Kost?" In the months that passed, we learned he was living just a mile from the Rangefinder Magazine office in Santa Monica, which led to Bill Hurter and me visiting him a couple of times.
• Nick Vedros: The boxer just below Joe's print from Venice Beach is thanks to Nick Vedros. It's heavyweight boxer, Razor Ruddock. If I recall the story correctly, he was fighting Lennox Lewis that night and was knocked out in the second round, not long after Nick captured the portrait.​

• Tom Danielson: "The Nitro Boys" baseball hat is one of my favorites. Most of my diving adventures included two buddies, Tom Danielson and Bob Rose. The two of us took a trip to Anthony's Key Resort in Honduras. We dove multiple times every day, and the day before we left, we received an invitation to photograph trained dolphins in the wild. We couldn't pass it off and decided that since the plane, a prop job, out of Roatan the next morning didn't reach a very high altitude, we'd be safe. (You never dive the last day of a trip, needing to give your body time to off-gas the nitrogen.) Well, the next morning we literally sat and watched our computers clear as the plane took off! So I had two hats made, "The Nitro Boys: We don't need no stickin' gauges!"
• George Bush Sr: Last on the list for today's post is a lesson in autographs. That's President Bush with me and Al Zimmerman in the bottom right corner. Al was one of the winners in the George Bush fishing tournament in the Florida Keys. I sent the print to President Bush to sign...and here's the lesson. If you value the autograph, make sure it's written in an ink that doesn't fade!  His signature is no longer visible.

​Then there are all the little things on the shelves, but each with BIG memories. It all started on a trip back from Bonaire with my buddy Tom and his son. Tom had gone to the men's room and left his backpack with us. Just across from the waiting area, a local craftsman was selling the ugliest small desk lamps I'd ever seen. I made a quick purchase and snuck it into Tom's bag. That started a "gotcha" battle between me and Tom that lasted for years. The it grew and included some crazy collectibles, mainly from Bob Rose, Kayce Baker, Duncan MacNab, Bob Thompson, Paul Fishkin and Bob Nunn, to name a few of my knucklehead friends.

Wishing everybody a day to make new memories. Remember today's memory-makers are tomorrow's throwbacks. Whether you're saving them on shelves or just shooting "neurochromes," you can't appreciate where you're going if you don't keep tabs on where you've been.

​Happy Throwback Thursday!