Halcyon, end of summer days in ’80s Massachusetts

Back in the early 1960s, Stephen DiRado remembers sitting in the backseat of the family Volkswagen Beetle, his mother at the wheel, wholly undeterred by a chaotic storm of thunder and hail pummelling the streets of Worcester, Massachusetts, Just as they came to the summit of Belmont Hill, a bolt of lightning hit the car. ​“We all screamed, but nothing happened,” DiRado says. ​“Then I saw another lightning bolt hit Bell Pond. I asked my mother, ​‘What is this place?’ And she said, ​‘Oh, that’s Bell Pond. I used to swim in that pond years ago.’” 

With those words, the sky suddenly cleared and the sun returned. It was a portentous moment, but of what DiRado would not find out until 1983 when he returned to Bell Pond as a young photographer freshly graduated from Massachusetts College of Art. He pulled into the parking lot, pulled out a tripod-mounted camera, and introduced himself to a couple of kids, saying, ​“Hi, everybody. My name is Stephen DiRado, and I’m right out of art school, and I would really, really like to work on a project about a community! Can I stay here for the summer?” 

In proper Gen X fashion, the kids tore him apart. ​“Who the fuck are you?” one demanded while another shot back, ​“You a pervert?” A third sneered, ​“You wanted to become a cop?” But DiRado stayed the course, promising to return day after day, and give them all free photos in return. They didn’t believe him, until they saw it for themselves. ​“I shot a thousand photos that summer. I couldn’t let go,” DiRado says. 

• Read next: Inside the bedrooms of American youth during the ​’80s and ​’90s

By the sixth or seventh day, DiRado got the word: Freddie needed to speak to him on top of the hill. ​“Who’s Freddie?” DiRado asked. ​“You’ll find out,” they promised. With great trepidation, he returned to the summit of Belmont Hill. There, a Latino teen with a faded black eye, massive scar on his nose, and scars across his arms, looked him up and down. ​“You’re Stephen, the picture guy,” Freddie said. ​“I’ve seen every picture you’ve taken over the last week, and you don’t see Black. You don’t see white. You see people for who they are. You are welcome here, and I’ll make sure that you will always be safe. There is something about you that is important, and is going to make us somebody.” 

Nearly half a century later, Freddie’s prophecy has come to pass with the publication of Bell Pond (TBW Books), The book chronicles life at the swimming pond through the lens of an emerging artist seeking kinship through collaboration. It was a lesson DiRado learned as a young boy watching his father, Gene, command the room with a camera at family gatherings. ​“He could go into a situation and control everybody for those few seconds, and they were eager to be photographed because it was an affirmation of what they were doing,” he says. 

With Bell Pond, DiRado returns to where it all began. ​“I learned about early love, establishing love, and that sense of fantasy that comes with those first days of love,” he says. ​“Teenagers infatuated, falling in love, lusting over each other, and then they’re all divorcing by September. I watched couples break up, they were only 16, 17, 18 years old. Some kids were finding themselves, or were very depressed and would confess their deepest secrets to me because I was the person there for them.” 

• Read next: A British coming-of-age story, told through photography

In the end, Freddie and DiRado shared a love for Bell Pond, knowing those who misunderstood the scene were speaking from ignorance. ​“I can’t tell you how many people told me, ​‘Don’t do it. It is dangerous. Are you out of your mind?’ And I told them, ​‘This is the most important thing I’ve ever done in my life,’” DiRado says. ​“They asked me, ​‘Why don’t you use a 35 millimeter camera? You can run with that. Why are you using this box camera on a tripod?’ I told them, ​‘Because it shows respect.’”

Bell Pond by Stephen DiRado is published by TBW Books.

Miss Rosen is a freelance arts and photography writer, follow her on X.

Buy your copy of Huck 83 here.

Enjoyed this article? Follow Huck on Instagram and join Club Huck’s mailing list for more from the cutting edge of sport, music and counterculture.