Bette S. Garber, Saw the Beauty of the Big Rig, Dies at 65
by Krishna Andavolu
NOVEMBER 24, 2008 TAGS:
Unless you subscribe to American Trucker Magazine, Trucker News, Roadstar or Heavy Duty Truck Magazine, the name Bette S. Garber probably doesn’t ring a bell. If you do, or if you have an abiding interest in the sub-culture of customized big rigs, then Bette S. Garber is your Jacques Cousteau. Over the course of a thirty-year obsession, Garber dove headlong into the colorful, ornate, flame-plastered world of custom-designed and decorated 18-wheelers--the great whales of the interstate.
In documenting the resplendent variety of long haul trucking expression, Garber published four coffee table books and led a small but dedicated group of trucking documentarians. She died on November 13. She was 65.
Garber would suspend herself from highway overpasses and rig herself to the tops of trucks to find better angles and off-kilter compositions that emphasized the looming grace of a fully customized tractor-trailer. She found, in the combination of chrome exhaust pipes, shining hubcaps, graphics, mudflaps and, of course, hood ornaments, an esoteric balance of decorative elements. These were moving works of art.
She also inspired the spirit of competition between long haulers who, from across the country, would see other trucks in the pages of those magazines to which Garber was a frequent contributor.
Her love for trucks and trucking culture emerged from frequent business and sales road trips taken for a microscope company she started with her husband in the 1970s. She got a CB radio to get better traffic updates and soon started talking back to the truckers, eating with them at truck stops, learning about the culture of long-haul transportation. Finally, she found that documentary photography was her calling, her method of appreciation and expression.
Over the years, she began to write about trucking. In 2002, Garber published an investigative story about sleep apnea in Heavy Duty Truck Magazine, which caused many truckers to seek preventative help.
Her single-mindedness bordered on the comical. Take the titles for her four coffee table books: Custom Semi-Trucks (2003), Custom Semi (2005), Custom Semi-Trucks 2 (2006) and, finally, Ultra Custom Semi-Trucks (2008).
Garber’s life was, however, a colorful example of how an interest during one’s professional life can be transformed into a notable, fun and beautiful cultural contribution. Whether that interest is in trucks, terrapins or totebags, all it takes is unflinching dedication to your craft and a durable sense of this world’s wonders.
In these times of insecure employment for many, perhaps we should all be looking to find our own Big-Rigs, rolling unperturbed through the great plains of our consciousness.
Krishna Andavolu is managing editor of Obit.
In documenting the resplendent variety of long haul trucking expression, Garber published four coffee table books and led a small but dedicated group of trucking documentarians. She died on November 13. She was 65.Garber would suspend herself from highway overpasses and rig herself to the tops of trucks to find better angles and off-kilter compositions that emphasized the looming grace of a fully customized tractor-trailer. She found, in the combination of chrome exhaust pipes, shining hubcaps, graphics, mudflaps and, of course, hood ornaments, an esoteric balance of decorative elements. These were moving works of art.
She also inspired the spirit of competition between long haulers who, from across the country, would see other trucks in the pages of those magazines to which Garber was a frequent contributor.
Her love for trucks and trucking culture emerged from frequent business and sales road trips taken for a microscope company she started with her husband in the 1970s. She got a CB radio to get better traffic updates and soon started talking back to the truckers, eating with them at truck stops, learning about the culture of long-haul transportation. Finally, she found that documentary photography was her calling, her method of appreciation and expression.
Over the years, she began to write about trucking. In 2002, Garber published an investigative story about sleep apnea in Heavy Duty Truck Magazine, which caused many truckers to seek preventative help.
Her single-mindedness bordered on the comical. Take the titles for her four coffee table books: Custom Semi-Trucks (2003), Custom Semi (2005), Custom Semi-Trucks 2 (2006) and, finally, Ultra Custom Semi-Trucks (2008).
Garber’s life was, however, a colorful example of how an interest during one’s professional life can be transformed into a notable, fun and beautiful cultural contribution. Whether that interest is in trucks, terrapins or totebags, all it takes is unflinching dedication to your craft and a durable sense of this world’s wonders.In these times of insecure employment for many, perhaps we should all be looking to find our own Big-Rigs, rolling unperturbed through the great plains of our consciousness.
Krishna Andavolu is managing editor of Obit.
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