hannah's history

14 candles were on my birthday cake that hot summer day. I had eyed a primitive Vivitar digital camera earlier, before they were commonplace and even of good quality. It was pleasantly purple with space enough on it for 100 pictures, and the LCD screen displayed only the number of photos I had left available. Despite my father's protests that I'd never use it, my mother was insistent on buying it for me. From the moment I unwrapped it at the Detroit Lakes Pizza Hut until it died (which, honestly, wasn't long), it was with me, capturing the moments I wanted to remember. It went with me to my high school youth group, random trips to the local Dairy Queen for ice cream, and summer camping trips and music festivals. Like most high-schoolers before Selfies existed, there were an over-abundance of pictures of friends blowing awkward amounts of bubble gum and hanging upside down off railings. Though they're hardly Pulitzer-worthy, they still captured a moment in time, moments I'd likely have forgotten had those pictures not existed. This was, unbeknownst to me, the beginning of my desire to tell the story.

Several years later, I ended up in the room now only known to me as "The J-Room" taking Yearbook as a class. Over those nine months, I learned how to capture enchanting photos with a Nikon D30, write journalistic-style articles and captions, and design a layout. I learned how to track down a person for a quote like I was the CIA operative tracking down Bin Laden, all in addition to maintaining some semblance of sanity while approaching deadlines. Mostly, though, I learned how to have fun while taking on this task of epic proportions. Just ask our fearless editor, Kate "Hey, Kate....?" Amundson who responded to those words as if they were indeed her full name, or our King of Journalism himself, Mr. Scott Winter, who pretended like hours with teenagers obsessed with Dairy Queen, highly-caffeinated sodas, free pizza, and incessantly playing pranks on him (and perhaps even his sacred coffee) were indeed worth it.

Apparently I achieved something of great value within those short months, as well, going on to win many awards with our state-wide scholastic press association. My passion for telling a story continued into college as a journalism major, working on the staff newspaper as head photographer and editor for our Arts & Entertainment section, where again, my love for caffeinated beverages and penning history met in a room where perhaps the rest of the staff was just as crazy as I was, though I'm sure they'll all vehemently deny such an accusation.

My current life finds me working at a self-publishing company called UbuildABook in beautiful Southern California, just a short 10-minute drive from the iconic landmark known as Mugu Rock along the Golden Coast. It's there I meet designers and artists, writers and historians, PTA moms and journalism homeschool teachers. Some of them are far more knowledgeable than I and some of them haven't a clue where to begin. I claim not to be an expert, but to having a duty to share what I know so that I may assist you in putting your history in the books.