By Philip Sean Curren, Staff Writer
Taking pictures for a living brought Beverly Schaefer in the presence of presidents and professional athletes, fulfilled an ambition she had when she was young and even got her on John McEnroe’s bad side., She can be found often on the campus of Princeton University, perhaps seated on the wooden floor of Jadwin Gym or on the sidelines at the football stadium, in her role as the official photographer for the university athletic department, a job she has had since 1997. With 37 men’s and women’s teams playing on overlapping schedules, there is no shortage of games for her to cover., She seeks to capture the raw emotion of sport — like the fleeting moment of elation that Roger Federer lets out at a critical moment in a tennis match — that she sees through the viewfinder of her Canon Mark IV camera., “I’m always looking for the emotion in their face, it’s all about the emotion of the game, the emotion, the happiness, the jubilation or the old agony of defeat,” she said during a roughly one-hour interview at PJ’s Pancake House in Princeton. “Now that I work for a university, they’re not interested in crying, losing photos that you would be if you were shooting for a wire service or a magazine.”, Over a plate of breakfast food, she is as candid as the photos she takes. She shared how she compares her work to that of her competitors to see what images they took, discussed how her profession has changed during her roughly 35-year-career and recalled the moment she showed her mother her photos in the New York Times and Sports Illustrated., For a photographer like Ms. Schaefer, covering sports has provided unparalleled access and proximity to the athletes she is covering. It also means not sitting on a comfortable chair in a climate-controlled press box., “I’m out in the hot, I’m out in the cold, I’m out in the rain, I’m out in the snow,” she said. “Most people sit in an office. I’m outside. My mom says, ‘You’re like a roofer, you’re outdoors nine months out of the year.’ ”, Yet at 56, she lives without regrets, even as she has never had a full-time job in a peripatetic career., “See, I don’t think I’m artistic at all, because I compare myself to other photographers that I see,” she said working on the omelet on her plate. “And when I’m at event (and) I see Michael Mancuso (a photographer with the Times of Trenton) there, and I know he’s going to eat my lunch, because he sees things that none of us see. And I’m not the only photographer that feels that way.”, Ms. Schaefer grew up in Delaware County, Pennsylvania. Two friends from high school — one a Phillies fan, the other a Flyers fan — helped get her interested in sports, and a seed for a future career was planted., “Going to games and seeing the photographers are down there in the front row, you’re really on top of the action,” she said., Growing up, she had made up her mind that she did not want a traditional woman’s job., “I remember in high school,” she said, “refusing to take typing classes, this way I could never be stuck as a job as a secretary. I said I will never be a nurse, a teacher or a secretary. And in the ’70s, those were the only jobs women had.”, Later in the interview, she said her goal was to photograph professional sports., After high school, she attended Mount Vernon College, an all-women’s school, in Washington, D.C., that later merged with George Washington University., Going to Baltimore Orioles baseball and Washington Capitals hockey games helped her meet a sports writer who was freelancing for a newspaper in Virginia. Starting when she was a junior in college, the paper gave her credentials to take pictures for them for free., After graduating in 1982, she moved to New Jersey and started taking pictures for the Star Ledger as a stringer. Realizing she would not be able to pay the bills on what she earned doing that, she moved back home and interned briefly for another newspaper., She then sought work at the Trenton Times, which was covering pro sports in New Jersey and Philadelphia, and got assignments there as a freelancer. For different outlets, she has covered a range of sports and events, like Wimbledon and the U.S. Open tennis tournaments, and other competitions., She recalled the time being in Philadelphia for a tennis tournament that Mr. McEnroe, a fiery personality on the court, was playing. The repeating click-click sound of the shutter must have set him off., “And he’s walking back to his chair and just scowled at me and he must have said something right to me, I don’t know the exact quote. But he said something to me that was nasty,” she said. “But it was like a bark at me. And I just remember I was so nervous, my heart was pounding so hard … .”, Her first assignment for Princeton was in November 1997, to photograph a Yale-Princeton football game, played at old Giants Stadium in the sleet. Unbeknownst to her, the assignment was really a tryout between her and a second photographer at the game., Afterward, she was told she got the job, one she has never let go., In her role, she has to make sure she is taking photos of all the Princeton athletes, as opposed to the way a wire service or newspaper photographer might be just getting peak action photos. That was a lesson she learned taking photos for hockey playing cards, a mental drill to get photos of everyone, not just the stars., “It doesn’t do us any good to have 50 pictures of the captain doing great,” she said, “but then we don’t have any pictures of the second string and third string.”, Yet photography is a tough business, she finds, at a time when some publications would rather use free photos by amateurs to save money. As technology has replaced film and developing photos in a darkroom, the demands of producing content rapidly have stripped the joy out of the profession., “I don’t think photography is fun for any of the pros anymore, the industry is too precarious, there’s no camaraderie any more,” she said. “Because of digital, every publication needs something for the website, for the Twitter, everything, right now.”, Yet her career has brought her face to face with world leaders and world class athletes. Once, getting the time wrong for a photo shoot at the Empire State Building with Mr. Federer after one of his U.S. Open wins, she hurried in a panic to the landmark skyscraper on Fifth Avenue. Thankfully for her, she had not missed anything, as he had to use the men’s room. So she wound up sharing the elevator with him all the way to the top., “So him and I get up, we walk down the hall. Security and his handlers, they’re all trailing behind; now I’ve just got time to make small talk with Roger Federer,” she said. “And I’m thinking, ‘I’m standing next to the greatest men’s tennis player ever.’ ”
