August 11, 1985–The scene was crowded during a fund raiser inside St. Louis Centre where $90,000 was raised for the State of St. Louis campaign on opening night of the mall. Photo by JB Forbes

This image of the St. Louis Centre Mall first appeared in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch August 11, 1985. Several people commented to me on Friday, when this image ran again, how shocking it was to see an image of the now abandoned mall filled with people.  Those comments reminded me how a good picture, like wine, gets better with age.  Take a click through this slide show of images that shows St. Louis Centre from the mid-1980’s and now in its current abandoned state.

When I talk at camera clubs or to amateur photographers I always stress the need for them to print out their pictures.  Having thousands of fantastic images of special family moments and events sitting on your hard drive is inviting disaster. My concern in this digital age is that as hard drives fail and CDs/DVDs go bad an entire generation photographs will vanish leaving people with only their faded memories.  Back in the day we all had shoe boxes full of family pictures.  The filing method may not have been optimal from an archival stand point, but barring a fire or flood, the boxes of pictures were available for years.

The moment the camera clicks it records a wealth of information that at the time you may over look and take for granted.  Things like hair styles, clothes, furniture and cars that seem ordinary to you now, will take on greater meaning to you years on down the road.  The picture you thoughtlessly delete had all those little gems of information, and you deleted it.

So my advice for all those family pictures you have sitting your hard drive, cell phone, or memory card is to upload them to your favorite online photo service and printed them out.  Print them all out.  If you bothered to shoot the picture you should print it and throw in a shoe box and let it age for a few decades.  I promise you your investment in hard prints now will pay off years down the line as you thumb through you stack of prints.