There are no pictures to convey the strange metamorphosis of Bob DeLong, a union printer who made his mark at the Bangor Daily News as one of the paper’s most likable and reliable photographers.

After 22 years as a BDN “shooter” and a total of 34 years with the paper behind him, DeLong retired Feb. 1 from the paper at the age of 62. He leaves a legacy of historic moments captured forever by his lens and a group of co-workers who appreciated his amiable approach to the job and ability to deliver a quality photo.

But it almost didn’t turn out that way.

DeLong arrived at the NEWS from the Brunswick Times-Record in 1968 to work in the paper’s composing room as a typographer. At that time, there were about 100 members of the International Typographers Union working evenings at the paper. It was demanding work with precise requirements. DeLong worked in what was known as “ad alley,” setting advertisements by hand with hot-lead type and zinc-plated, halftone photographic engravings called cuts.

Despite a longtime interest in photography, that was about as close as DeLong thought he would get to becoming a BDN photographer. And at the time, that was OK.

“I really enjoyed that work down there when it was a craft, as opposed to the sort of assembly line process it later turned into,” DeLong recalled. “We were like fine carpenters who cut lead to fit. And it had to be damn near perfect.”

Changes in the newspaper printing industry prompted a move toward a new “cold-type” process in the early 1970s. Type at the BDN would now be set photographically and then imprinted on paper to be pasted onto a facsimile of a newspaper page. It was the end of the craft for most of the ITU members, whose methods had remained largely unchanged for generations.

Versatile and ambitious, DeLong saw the change as an opportunity. Throughout most of the ’70s, he had been stringing for United Press International, picking up freelance requests during the day, reporting for work in the composing room at night. Like most of his co-workers, DeLong knew the days of his trade were numbered. Just when he was beginning to think about other options, the position of staff photographer was posted internally at the paper.

DeLong’s application for the job in 1980 came at a good time for the paper, which was trying to trim its ITU work force through early retirement incentives and job reclassifications. DeLong brought some talent and enthusiasm to the NEWS photography department while cutting the composing room staff by another position. He was hired almost without delay.

Upstairs, downstairs

Getting the job in photography was one thing, trying to fit in would be another challenge. The photo department in the ’70s and ’80s was a fairly elite group whose members initially were inclined to view the arrival of a typesetter from downstairs with mild suspicion. They were all BDN lifers: Danny Mahar, who worked his entire career at the paper after his father had preceded him in the same job. Carroll Hall, the good-natured shooter from Lewiston whom everyone called “Mum.” Jimmy “The Snake” Verrill and Jack Loftus, who retired from the BDN last fall after 43 years. Joe Brooks was the department head who hired DeLong. He now serves as a Democratic state legislator from Winterport.

They were a colorful bunch of people with over-their-credit-line egos and eager to see what DeLong had to contribute. The new guy was determined to fit in, and he figured the best way to succeed was by delivering a good day’s work with no complaints. If the shooters had their way, that probably would be DeLong’s epitaph: “He always came back with a picture and he never complained.”

“Photography was what I wanted to do,” DeLong said. “I was worried more about whether I could do the job than whether I would be accepted. I had no troubles whatsoever. But the old crew was a little different then, it was more of a family. Those guys had all been there since they were kids and it was not unusual to see them stay with the paper until they retired.”

DeLong wrapped his arms around his new job that, at the time, focused more on reflecting the everyday life of eastern and northern Maine. His days were filled with requests for shots of fires, police arrests, accidents, ribbon cuttings, four generations of a family, new Anah Temple Shrine officers, a spring benefit for the Bangor Junior League and whenever the digital clock at Bangor Savings Bank went over 100 degrees. All of those assignments were as predictable as the seasons. But don’t try to argue their worth with DeLong.

“My contention was that some of those photos are still necessary to serve as records of what happened,” he said. “So, yeah, I don’t think they all have to be Pulitzer Prize winners.”

Best foot forward

DeLong enjoyed the adrenaline rush of speeding to the scene of a crime-in-progress and the uncertainty of never knowing exactly what his day would be like. Whether it was “ho-hum” or “a zinger,” DeLong would insist that, for the most part, he liked the idea of not knowing where he was going.

But there was at least one time when DeLong concedes knowing would have been better. Anxious to get the best shot at an evening farm fire, he stalked the perimeter to size up all angles of the fire scene. Then he backed up and put his foot down – into midair.

“All of a sudden the ground went out from underneath me. I didn’t know where I was going but I was rolling down this bank,” he said. “After about 20 feet, I finally came to a stop, but there was a split second of not knowing what was happening or where the hell I was going. I still remember crawling out thinking it would be good to get back to where there was some light.”

Then there was the moment when DeLong found himself directly in front of a Bangor police officer with a drawn and loaded revolver. A teen-ager in New Capehart had a gun and he was pointing it directly at the officer. One bullet in the stomach later, everyone found out that the kid’s gun was a fake and the policeman’s was real. Nobody got a better view than DeLong.

“I was a long ways away with a huge lens, but it looked like I was standing just behind the kid in the viewfinder,” he said. “When the cop pulled the trigger, it looked like he was pointing the gun right at me. I dropped right to the ground because I thought I was going to get it. It was scary as hell.”

DeLong worked with a team of practical jokers who could scheme up elaborate ruses in a matter of minutes. As the new guy in the department, he wasted no time in demonstrating his own sense of humor. At the time, Jimmy “The Snake” Verrill had gotten his hands on a fish-eye lens, a wide-angle device that produces a curved, distorted image. Verrill liked it so much that he used it all the time, much to the chagrin of his boss, Jack Loftus. DeLong said it became commonly known that Loftus was going to blow his stack if he saw one more of Verrill’s already overdone wacky fish-eye shots.

Verrill immediately put the lens away. But DeLong found one that belonged to a friend. He borrowed it to take a shot and then stamped Verrill’s name on the back of the print. Loftus came to work, saw the fish-eye photo and, well, you figure it out. Verrill, on the other hand, never did put it together.

“I can still see Snake sitting at his desk saying, ‘Gee, I don’t remember taking it, but I must have because I’m the only one around who has one of these lenses,'” DeLong said. “He died before I ever got a chance to tell him it was me.”

After covering six presidents, major catastrophes such as the 1998 ice storm and UMaine’s National Division I hockey championship, DeLong held a job that allowed him to be a witness to many of Maine’s great historic moments. Yet, in the end, he concedes it is the smaller, local events and contacts with everyday people that he will carry with him into a self-predicted “semiretirement.”

“Time seems to be slowing down now. Maybe I’m just getting too damn anxious to leave,” DeLong confided as he surveyed an empty photo lab on a recent weekend. “I bet after I leave, every time I hear a siren I’ll be wondering what the hell that was. But I probably won’t do that right away.”