Missouri State Parks Hosts Photograph Exhibit During Month of October at Current River State Park
OutdoorHub 10.03.12
Ozark Light: The Photography of Charles Elliott Gill” will be on display at Current River State Park in Shannon County each weekend in October. Sponsored by Missouri State Parks, the free display will be open from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. each Saturday and Sunday in the gymnasium.
“Ozark Light” is a traveling display featuring more than 100 photographs of the Ozarks taken by Gill with his 1906 Seroco extended-view camera. The exhibit is on loan to Missouri State Parks from the Missouri State Archives. In 2002, the photographer’s son, Edward Addison Gill, donated his father’s collection of 722 glass plate negatives and original prints to the Missouri State Archives.
Charles Elliott Gill, a native of Dent County, was born July 8, 1869. He grew up on a farm at the head of the Meramec River. When Gill was 18 years old, he received his first camera but did not actively document life in the Ozarks until he was in his forties. Gill continued to travel and document the upper Ozarks until 1947. In 1943, Gill sold the family farm and moved to Salem. Gill died on July 15, 1962, at the age of 93.
Current River State Park is under development but will be open to the public for activities such as hiking, fishing, picnicking and guided tours of the buildings from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturdays and Sundays in October.
Current River State Park is located 27 miles south of Salem or 15 miles north of Eminence on Highway 19. For more information about the exhibit, call the park at 573-858-3015. For more information about Missouri state parks and historic sites, visit, mostateparks.com. Missouri State Parks is a division of the Missouri Department of Natural Resources.
