Eric Crossan

PHOTOGRAPHY..Thats all I’ve ever done for a living..I had my first sports photograph published in 1970 when I was 14 years old in the ‘Newark Weekly Post”.I was paid $ 3.00 for the image. In 1972 as a junior at Christiana  High School  I was named the Delaware Scholastic Newspaper Photographer of the Year. Also during my Junior year i won 1st place in the National  Press Photography Assoc.’s  Eastern region monthly contest, and still hold the honor of being the youngest to do so. In my senior year of high school I started shooting freelance assignments for the Philadelphia Inquirer. Most of the assignments were in Delaware for there Sunday paper.. After a year I moved over to the Philadelphia Bulletin where I covered all Delaware assignments and sports as well as some South Jersey and South Easter PA.While working on  these assignments I began meeting business people and started shooting some advertising and corporate work..Then in 1981 I was hired by the Univ. of Delaware as on of 2 photographers working on the campus,then moved up to The University’s  photographer and stayed for about two more years. All along my own business continued to grow and a time came when I could no longer commit to the UD and left to run Crossan Studios full time. 

Between my newspaper work,corporate and industrial assignments I have traveled on assignments to several countries around the world,made photo-graphs at the White House and US Capitol shot a sunrise and sunset in the same day in the Mojave Desert and spent numerous hours shooting aerials from a helicopter. Because of these assignments and an awards dinner I worked for about 10 years I have met and photographed many of the countries movers and shakers and celebrities. Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan,HW Bush and GW Bush are Presidents I have photographed.

Then there are the estate weddings and parties,many for members of the DuPont family and friends and I will NEVER FORGET being asked to photo-graph the DuPont FAMILY REUNION at Longwood gardens in Kennett Square,PA. I hired 3 other photographers to help photograph the over 2,000 people and events. Another assignment i will NEVER FORGEt is the visit of the KING and QUEEN of Sweden to Wilmington(a sister city) Wilm. Mayor Tom Maloney ,hired me to cover the event. it was very cold,I statred at about 7:30 AM when they arrived by helicopter. Continued non stop throughout the day,then changed into Blacktie Tux and photographed about 200 people shaking their hands in a receiving line and finished with a dinner in their honor at the Hotel DuPont, leaving around midnight. I could really go on with many more memorable job descriptions but there are just so many.. What I have learned the most from all of these events combined is how to work with people and react to what ever is thrown at me when it comes to making photographs.. Almost every situation is different and many could never be recreated again which make me proud to have been asked to photograph them and deliver the images on time. While the pace   have slowed some what, each assignment  is just as challenging and the same work ethics are applied only today its all digital and thats a whole other story. Thanks for listening, Eric