Glenn Franco SimmonsGlenn at The Dahlia Garden in Golden Gate Park.
My motto is, “Photography is my passion. Flower photography is my art.”
Welcome to my website where I display some of my creative photographic talent. I completely reformatted the site in 2022, so throughout 2023 and going into 2024, landscape, flower, graphic art, religious-themed, car and other photos will be added back. I hope you find something inspirational on my website.
I grew up in Freshwater, Calif., and am an alumnus of Garfield Elementary School, Winship Junior High
Glenn Franco SimmonsGlenn in Mariposa Grove.
School, Eureka Senior High School and Humboldt State University (now Cal Poly Humboldt, where I was
graduated with honors in my major of journalism and minor (emphasis phase) in The Study of Genocide, which instilled in me my passion of vociferously opposing antisemitism, Nazism and Fascism).
Growing up in Freshwater, cow pastures were where me, my brother Mario and friends played football. You had to be careful where you ran! I also hiked extensively in logged, second- and old-growth forestland in Freshwater and Kneeland with my Irish Setter, Shannon of The Redwoods.
My journalism career began as sports editor/writer at The Redwood Bark at ESHS, as well as chief editorial writer, where I led a campaign to decommission the now-defunct Humboldt Bay Nuclear Power Plant (it took a few more years!). I also led the coverage of the expansion of Redwood National Park.
My professional career led me to the positions of newspaper publisher and longtime editor of both dailies and weeklies in several rural communities on California's isolated,
Glenn Franco SimmonsGlenn at the San Jose Municipal Rose Garden.
rural North Coast (brief work history is below). I’m the only North Coast journalist to have worked at almost all the traditional legacy (pre-1980 that weren’t yet closed) print publications in Humboldt and Del Norte counties.
Post-newspaper career, I became known as The Flower Photographer of Silicon Valley. I’ve been a member of Zenfolio, which hosts this site, since 2012, a member of the Professional Photographers of America since 2011 and, for many years, The Society of Professional Journalists (I still write occasional columns and journalistic articles). I’m also a member of the Nevada Artists Association, The American Dahlia Society, HelpMeFind (roses), and Dave’s Garden.
Follow me on eBird, for (mostly) Carson City birding.
Word-of-mouth is my only advertising, so if you could share this website on social media and with friends and family, I would really appreciate it.
Work History
My nearly 25-year newspaper career was spent mostly working for one local newspaper chain that was then purchased in bankruptcy by another local newspaper group, after I informed the owner/publisher of that group that the newspaper chain I was a part of was going bankrupt due to Black Monday 1987.
Newspapers where I worked were all in Humboldt and Del Norte counties on The Redwood Coast of California, except for a short stint as the then-Santa Rosa Business Journal editor (the area’s housing was cost-prohibitive, so I moved back to Humboldt County).
Glenn Franco SimmonsGlenn at Filoli.
The newspapers and radio stations worked were (chronological order):
• The Arcata Union (business editor)
• The Del Norte Triplicate (editor)
• The Redwood Record (editor)
• The Humboldt Beacon (editor)
• The Ferndale Enterprise (guest editor/reporter) & Sunny Fortuna 100 F.M. (anchor) (both while I worked as recycling manager and then general manager at Eel River Disposal & Resource Recovery Inc., when I took four and a half years off from journalism to focus on my family)
• The Times-Standard,
• KINS News (I worked at KINS & T-S & The Eureka Reporter, at different times, simultaneously for six years)
• The Eureka Reporter (co-founded with businessman Robin Arkley II and where I served as publisher for almost three years as first, an online newspaper, and then a thrice-weekly newspaper before going daily and necessitating a full-time publisher), and
• Times of Israel non-paid blogger.
The newspaper positions in each chain were all promotions, as I moved to a larger newspaper and/or more responsibility with each promotion. While at each newspaper, I also wore the hats of photojournalist, sports photographer, reporter, copy editor and proofreader.
Glenn and BuddyGlenn with Buddy, who just passed away. Glenn named him Buddy and he was Glenn's little buddy, but also Kathleen, whom Buddy loved with all his heart, too.
In my post-newspaper career, I've worked for myself as a photographer and for Star Roses and Conard-Pyle, where I took professional rose photos for ads, publications, a magazine and websites. My photos, including auto photos, have been published from Eastern Europe to the USA.
I am a father, grandfather to almost a dozen grandchildren, and for 20 years happily married to my loving wife Kathleen. We have two dogs, Rosie and Sammy, and four cats, Oh, Sheba, Pericles and Calliope. Our beloved friend, comedian and neighborhood favorite cat, Buddy, passed away much too young. He was almost six and seemed like he had more than nine lives. He didn’t and we miss him.
This site is dedicated to my loving wife Kathleen and to my late parents, Helen and Lee.
~ Glenn Thomas Franco Simmons
Carson City, Nev.
2024
(Editor's note: Please note that I use several free and two paid generative AI programs to generate creative content for my website. I usually note where it is being used, but in case I forget, I'm writing this disclaimer. My lovely wife Kathleen took all the photos of me.)