The Life They Built
A family can miss a place almost as deeply as it misses the people who made it matter.
Harold and Mildred Benore were part of a familiar North Toledo landmark: the distinctive circular Sunoco station once located at the corner of Alexis and Benore Roads—a road bearing the family name.
By the time their son Pat and his wife Rhonda approached me, Harold and Mildred had been gone for years.
The station was gone too.
But for the Benore family—and for many Toledo residents who remembered passing it—the unusual round station remained inseparable from the people, the neighborhood, and a particular time in the city’s history.
Pat and Rhonda wanted those pieces brought back together.
So I painted Harold and Mildred in front of the Sunoco station as it was remembered: husband and wife, family history and local landmark joined again in one image.
The portrait became more than a likeness of two people. It became a remembrance of the place where their story happened.
Sometimes what we want preserved is not simply a face, but an entire little piece of the world that existed around it.
Have a story you want preserved?
Let’s create a portrait that honors what matters most.
Start With a Photo →