Finding remarkable moments in unremarkable mornings
Scene Through the Lens with photographer Tom Gralish.
Bob Myers, president of Harris Blitzer Sports & Entertainment, owner/operator of the 76ers and the NHL’s New Jersey Devils, as well as a future Philadelphia WNBA team, talks to reporters after Mike Gansey made his first appearance as Sixers president of basketball operations.Read moreTom Gralish / Staff Photographer
I won’t be photographing any of the FIFA World Cup games here, but I did make The Inquirer’s sports photos Big Picture gallery for the second week in a row.
And again, my inclusion is not a traditional action photo. It’s from a press conference and the subject — Sixers new president of basketball operations Mike Gansey — isn’t even the focus of the image.
I also photographed him posing with team executives, holding a basketball, then a Sixers jersey, followed by his comments and Q & A with reporters, but I was more interested in the periphery, and stayed around after it was over — and most of the media left for more comments downstairs by the other executives (the featured image at the top).
Later in the week in Center City, I passed a youngster in full graduation cap and gown. I often play the role of street photographer so I walked behind them for a block.
If I were not a curious journalist I would’ve moved on, but I said hello and introduced myself as we walked together. Lynnette Lucas was taking her granddaughter Faith Green, 6, for a special lunch after her kindergarten graduation at Mastery Charter School. Lucas takes all her grandchildren to the Chili’s near the Convention Center for celebratory meals where the staff treats them well, especially server Tevin Jones. Faith was headed to a party with the rest of her family, with cake and ice cream later in the day. I switched from street photographer back to visual journalist and headed to my next assignment.
There are different definitions for street photography, but I always like what William Eggleston said: “Often people ask what I’m photographing, which is a hard question to answer. And the best what I’ve come up with is I just say: life today.”
Which brings me to my good friend and Inquirer photo colleague Alejandro A. Alvarez. Starting today Philadelphia will wake up differently. For decades, before the coffee shops unlocked their doors and the metal roll-up shutters were opened on newsstands Alex was already there. A street photographer who chases the morning light, Alex retired from the newspaper yesterday, almost exactly 38 years — Monday, June 13, 1988 — after he first stepped into a newsroom as a full-time newspaper staff photographer, at the Wilkes-Barre Times Leader.
That is not to say he won’t still be there with his camera, waiting for the sun to rise and bathe the sidewalks and neighborhoods with the day’s first warm light. He describes himself as a “professional wanderer about town, documenting the people and places I see.”
And I will probably see a lot more of him now as he will have more time for the street photography he most enjoys.
Readers — and his editors — will miss his breaking news coverage, as he will no longer be checking the news websites, apps, and tips from sources before heading out pre-dawn to visually report on the aftermath of overnight shootings, fires, or accidents. He usually filed his news photos before the reporters even turned on their computers.
The way he sees the city however, will endure and readers will still see his work, whenever Inquirer.com or the Inquirer or Daily News needs a photo to illustrate a story about SEPTA, or pedestrians and city workers, bikers and joggers and dog walkers — in all kinds of weather, they will tap into the admirable archive of his images in our digital library.
At The Inquirer, Alex photographed protests and elections; changes in the seasons and weather; parades, celebrations and memorial; kings and criminals. Yet his most memorable images came from those seemingly unremarkable mornings.
Since 1998 a black-and-white photo has appeared every Monday in staff photographer Tom Gralish’s “Scene Through the Lens” photo column in the print editions of The Inquirer’s local news section. Here are the most recent, in color:
June 8, 2026: Obet Montalvo, a digital strategist with Radicle Digital, finds a quiet nook at the Convention Center on Thursday June 4, 2026, while attending Netroots Nation, the country’s largest annual gathering for progressive political activists, and organizers. The fan fest is an outgrowth of the blog Daily Kos, and brings together thousands of grassroots organizers to participate in training sessions, panel discussions, and keynote addresses.Read moreTom Gralish / Staff Photographer
June 1, 2026: The signature half-rose stained glass window of the 1891 Grace Baptist Church is reflected in a glass wall inside the Temple Performing Arts Center, as a spring concert by Temple University Music Prep’s Center for Gifted Young Musicians gets underway below. A school started at the church so working men unable to afford traditional college could attend at night eventually became Temple University, and the congregation relocated to the suburbs. Over the years the building deteriorated and in 1986 university trustees voted to demolish it. Public outcry and help from the Preservation Alliance of Greater Philadelphia convinced Temple’s leaders to preserve the building, and a few years and $30 million later the old church was reborn in 2010 as a 1200-seat, multipurpose state-of-the-art event center. Read moreTom Gralish / Staff Photographer
May 25, 2026: A color guard marches in Laurel Hill Cemetery during the annual observance of traditional Decoration Day on Memorial Day weekend. The historic cemetery was the site of Philadelphia’s first observance in 1868, paying tribute to those who lost their lives in the Civil War. What is now known as Memorial Day became a national holiday in 1971. The re-creation is an annual tradition of the Gen. George B. Meade Post No. 1 Grand Army of the Republic and included a wreath-laying ceremony, pageantry, music and speeches. Flowers and flags were placed earlier on the graves of hundreds of known and unknown American veterans from the French and Indian War through the Iraq War.Read moreTom Gralish / Staff Photographer
May 25, 2026 (online version): A NASCAR Roadtripping fourth T-shirt ($14.98) - at the closest outpost to Philly - 4-1/2 hours away - of the Texas-based gas station convenience store chain known for its Beaver Nuggets and pristine potties, in Rockingham County, Is Buc-ee’s a true travel destination - or a tourist trap?Read moreTom Gralish / Staff Photographer
May 19, 2026: Robert Arana and Kevin Baraniecki (right) work on replacing the outer protective film on top of the structural safety glass pavilions that serve as the head house entrance to SEPTA’s 15th St/City Hall Station in Dilworth Park.Read moreTom Gralish / Staff Photographer
May 11, 2026: At the border of PA and NJ, halfway on the New Hope - Lambertville bridge. It’s a level and well-maintained walkway separated from the cars, making for a safe, short easy walk between the shops and restaurants in both downtowns. With great views of the Delaware River. Read moreTom Gralish / Staff Photographer
May 4, 2026: The hooves were all that remained of a life-size elk statue — sawed off at the ankles — in historic Harleigh Cemetery in Camden on Tuesday. The bronze elk statues were put up in cemeteries all over the country at the turn of the 20th century in what was called an “Elks Rest,” an area reserved for deceased members of the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks. In many lodges of the fraternal group founded in 1866, members who could not afford a burial were provided space in the “Rest” free of charge. The statue was since recovered and is back in the cemetery’s possession. Read moreTom Gralish / Staff Photographer
April 27, 2026: What just a week ago was a spring-time canopy of rosy blush blossoms is now a soft carpet of pink petals, on a sidewalk along Wayne Avenue in Germantown.Read moreTom Gralish / Staff Photographer
April 20, 2026: The water is turned back on in LOVE Park this week, marking another milestone as seasons change in the city. The splash fountain and basin-less main fountain in the park formally known as John F. Kennedy Plaza, was part of the site’s 2018 renovations, that came after the old park was flattened out, removing a traditional fountain and benches and levels that made it so enticing to skateboarders.Read moreTom Gralish / Staff Photographer
April 13, 2026: Workers set up the stage — with a cooling tower backdrop — for a Gov. Mikie Sherrill event at the PSEG Salem and Hope Creek Nuclear Generating Station in Lower Alloways Creek, N.J. Sherrill later signed legislation intended to make way for new nuclear energy projects in the Garden State by removing a key permitting hurdle that has created a de facto moratorium on new nuclear power for decades. Read moreTom Gralish / Staff Photographer
April 6, 2026: Work continues into the night, two floors above street level in Old City.Read moreTom Gralish / Staff Photographer
March 30, 2026: New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill (third from right) meets with members of the South Jersey business community while her youngest daughter, Marit, waits in lobby (rear). Mom was attending a fireside chat event hosted by the Chamber of Commerce of Southern New Jersey in Mount Laurel earlier this month.Read moreTom Gralish / Staff Photographer
March 23, 2026: The plowed snow mountain range at a corner of the PATCO Haddonfield station parking lot in mid-March. After the big Jan. 25 and Feb. 23 snow storms the transit agency started a contest to guess exactly when the humongous snow mountain will finally melt. They are offering a $20 Freedom Card to the winners.Read moreTom Gralish / Staff Photographer
March 16, 2026: Traffic moving at 45 mph on the Ben Franklin Bridge is photographed using a slow shutter speed from a PATCO commuter train traveling at 40 mph.Read moreTom Gralish / Staff Photographer
March 9, 2026: Marcin Danych (left), a friend now living in Chicago, films Mariusz Sliwa, his wife, Magdalena, and their 6-year-old son, Tymek, from Poznan, Poland, next to the Rocky statue at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. When Mariusz was a boy, his father was “a typical factory worker; he was working a lot, too,” Sliwa said. “He worked seven days a week. Even weekends.” When they had time together at night, they would watch “Rocky,” “playing it over and over, in the VHS.” It was just a part of his childhood, so he wanted his own son to visit Philadelphia to experience it. And to make a video for his dad, who couldn’t make the trip. Read moreTom Gralish / Staff Photographer
