The Time Has Finally Come

In a little over a week and a half, my fiance Alex and I will be leaving on a six month journey, crisscrossing America documenting small towns, through photography, illustration, interviews and the collection of artifacts. Think WPA photography meets Charles Kuralt. We call ourselves the Road Ramblers.
This project has been in the works since last fall. A couple of things in our lives happened all at once. Alex and I had been traveling extensively, picking for my vintage clothing business and for her senior thesis photo series focusing on boom towns in Montana, falling more and more in love with the places we were visiting and exploring. A TV show about vintage Americana I had been slated to host fell through after working through the summer with a production team in New York. My architecture thesis on authenticity took a turn toward examining places with a past vs. homogeneous sprawl. We got to talking about what the next step was- where do these projects go from here?



And so, in early December, we bought thirdhand shuttlebus and started the process of gutting it out. After months of throwing away our money at secondrate motels every weekend on our trips through the west, we knew if we were going to pull off a trip of the length we were planning, we would need someplace comfortable, someplace that felt like home. We're both the kind of people who, if we need something done, do it ourselves, so having the blank slate of the bus appealed to us. And starting way back with Further, there's just something more romantic about a bus conversion than an RV. Now that it's done, we're fully capable of living off grid, with solar panels, batteries and an inverter, gas stove, composting toilet, foot pump water and a fancy cooler. We've got the work space to handle any and all of our needs while we're on the road. With the bus finished and both of us recently graduated (Masters in Architecture for me, Bachelors in Photography for Alex), and everything we own either being sold off or put into storage, we're just about ready to go.
It's a funny thing tackling America. So many people have done it, from "On the Road" to "Blue Highways", "Easy Rider" to "Pee Wee's Big Adventure". These days, there's no shortage of people on instagram and the like, traveling full time in their Vanagons. What seems to be missing in these current projects is any sense of purpose or product. These are hipsters, out to find themselves, sponsored by outdoor equipment companies. At least the first generation hippie travelers worked odd jobs or craft fairs along the way. Thankfully, we've already found ourselves and our project's about something bigger.



This is a time of huge change for small towns. Manufacturing has either left entirely or shifted to larger plants elsewhere. Farming on an industrial scale has changed the way the town itself works. Other towns were bypassed decades ago by interstate highways and are slowly falling by the wayside. Meanwhile, new construction continues to sprawl, leaving with placeless places- strip malls, suburbia and endless chain restaurants. Pop culture idealizes the small town, but in a nostalgic, shallow way. The current trend in photography of "ruin porn" objectifies and exploits post industrial landscapes without addressing any of their content. Despite the transitions so many small towns are going through, these are places near and dear to our hearts. This is the fabric of America, and we try to come at it with an honest eye. Alex is heavily influenced by 1970s vernacular photography- think Stephen Shore, William Eggleston, Wim Wenders.



In addition to her photography, I will be doing illustrations as we go (samples of both of our work are attached). As we travel, we will be conducting an interview series (think Storycorps or WPA interviews) as we go, to try to further get our finger on a regional pulse. We'll be posting these on a youtube channel as we go.
At the end of all this, we plan on taking our writings, photography, illustrations, portraits, quotes, experiences, etc. and compiling it all into a comprehensive photo book. This is where you come in.
All of this is a massive undertaking (but we've never been ones to make things easy on ourselves), and the books and web series are going to be hugely labor intensive and costly. We need your help to make these things a reality and to share them back with you. We recently launched a kickstarter to offset some of the costs of the production of the book and online components. Remember, if we don't make the goal, we get nothing, so anything helps. We'd love to have you as a backer and to be able to bring our explorations directly to your computer.
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/263559793/road-ramblers
Spencer Stewart
And be sure to follow along at
https://www.instagram.com/roadramblers/
http://www.theroadramblers.com/
https://www.facebook.com/theroadramblers/

beautiful looking sketches! good luck with the journey ahead!

Sounds like a great project, i look forward to seeing more from you.
Good luck...

Happy Trails

Spencer this is an amazing project/journey/documentary that you and your fiancee are embarking upon. It has many personal implications for me as I grew up just outside a rural town along I-74 in Illinois of less than 700 people. I presently live outside a rural town of just a slightly larger population of around 1800 in North-Eastern Iowa. I see it daily - folks who sought to build something, make a name for thiemselves and thier neighbors, and then it all gets pulled out, quickly, or even overnight with the stroke of a pen.

I had no family in this area when I moved here, no restrictions other than a house budget for finding a place. I chose a "rural residential" neighborhood so that I could more actively become part of the local commuinity. I also like trees, hills, rivers and wildlife, and I have much of that in my yard or very close by anytime I desire. Plus I have neighbors with real names, occupations, and we have cookouts, and borrow each others tools, or watch each other's properties when someone is away.

Most of my co-workers spend 2X $$$ what I put forth to buy a new construction home in a suburban neighborhood in the larger city I live close to. I can't understand it. Huge house, 10' or less between homes, identical architecture, zero trees, and no community. Roads, roofs and Luxury SUV's that never open a window to wave to a neighbor, never spend time outside, never have a block party. Sorry, this may be a little personal, but it's just not for me.

I really like your idea, only thing I would add - in addition to photo-documing and drawing a lot of what you say -- Listen to the people you meet. Remember they are the textbooks that walk around us everyday...and I forget so often to learn from them. Everyone has a story. Hear thiers. Learn of thier intrests, what brings them joy, what may induce heart aches. Share yours too, and enjoy the community that you will get to be part of.

Have a wonderful journey and I'll see what I can do to support. Hope to see updates along the way!

Fantastic! Looking forward to the reports/updates.

Sounds like a real great adventure! One word of advice that mite make things easier when the times get tough! I was talking to some of my motorcycle buddy's, we all agreed, the most memorable trips were not the ones where the sun was shinning and the birds singing, the most memorable ones were the ones where things went wrong! When the sky let lose with rain, snow, hail and sleet, or it was boiling hot, or we had problems with the bikes, those were the rides we savor! So, with that in mind, Bon Voyage!

If you get anywhere near Pasadena, CA and feel like a beer and a meal, look me up.
I wish you the best on this fantastic journey. Will also see if we can help out on the kicker.

This looks incredibly interesting! I will definitely be following along.

Good luck in your journey.
Seems to be a fun thing travelling by road on the US.

Thanks for showing!

Spencer, as usual you are going to outdo yourself. What a fun project.

From your map, it appears you will miss Middle Tennessee, but if you change the route and get closer to Nashville, let me know. Would love to buy you and Alex dinner.

Have fun on your journey. PC

Good luck and Godspeed, Spencer and Alex. I envy you. For all of my adult life, I've told my wife I want to go on the "Great American Vacation" like my family did when I was a kid. The 60s, when I was growing up, saw my family pile into the IMpala and head out every summer for a week or two. We would have an end destination (Yellowstone, Montana, Wisconsin Dells), but no plans until we got there. So dad would take a couple weeks off and we'd head out. No reservations; we would either stop at a small motel (the kind with an office on one end and a string of rooms extending from it) or, if dad felt like pampering us, a Ramada Inn or TraveLodge.

I saw America that way growing up. It was fantastic. I would love to do it again (I got my Impala!). Until then, I will live vicariously through you. You're not coming through my neck of the woods (Dayton), instead going through northern Ohio. However, if your itinerary changes, and you get through SW Ohio. Beers and burgers are on me.

Thanks, everyone.

AeroFan_07 said:

I really like your idea, only thing I would add - in addition to photo-documing and drawing a lot of what you say -- Listen to the people you meet. Remember they are the textbooks that walk around us everyday...and I forget so often to learn from them. Everyone has a story. Hear thiers. Learn of thier intrests, what brings them joy, what may induce heart aches. Share yours too, and enjoy the community that you will get to be part of.

Click to expand...

We're all set up to do video interviews of people we meet along the way, and will have a running series online of those, to get a broader picture of places.

Peacoat said:

Spencer, as usual you are going to outdo yourself. What a fun project.

From your map, it appears you will miss Middle Tennessee, but if you change the route and get closer to Nashville, let me know. Would love to buy you and Alex dinner.

Have fun on your journey. PC

Click to expand...

It's a pretty loose map, and already changing. Needed to have a rough route to take, but as we find out about new places and as people step forward to put us up (the bus is comfortable and decked out, but we don't have laundry or a proper shower, so. . .), it's gradually changing.
We have a bunch of friends in Nashville we're planning on visiting, so we'll definitely be in that neck of the woods. I might need a reminder (and this goes for everyone- people are coming out of the woodwork, hard to keep it all straight), but would love to say hi when we're there. I think we're going to have a gallery showing in Princeton, KY shortly before Nashville, might be worth coming out for.

Best of luck on your trip! One question I've been wanting to ask you: how's the transmission on the bus?

Here's to hoping it's solid. We had the whole thing given the once over by a garage that specializes in shuttlebuses, and they gave it the all clear. It's a 6.5L diesel and only has 160,000 miles on it, so it should be good (famous last words) for another 150,000, and this trip is planned to be around 16,000 miles (though I'd imagine it'll probably be more like 20,000-25,000 by the end, because when do things ever go according to plan?). With the seats and wheelchair lift out and the new interior in, we're operating at roughly what its original "empty" weight was, so roughly 3400 pounds less than it's designed to carry. It's geared like a pickup rather than like a schoolbus, so it cruises at 80 comfortably on the highway. Not great going over mountains, but still will do 55 in that situation. Years ago I rode in a '70s International school bus going through mountains and with its gearing, it wouldn't top 30. The biggest issue we've had is just it being a big diesel which makes it a real pain to start in cold weather if the block's not plugged in. Our route should keep us out of the bitter cold for most of the trip, so hopefully that won't be an issue.

I've followed your on line work with great interest D. This project will be especially fascinating. An important historical document. Best of luck and safe travels.

I'll keep the porch light on.........

When you make that dip into Ohio, I hope we can finally meet.

What a wonderful story! Early congratulations to you both and, yes, please do post updates as you go about your journey!