Howard Katzenelle Watkins

Howard K.Watkins grew up in Southern California beforeattending UC Berkeley where he graduated in 1969 with a BA in Political Scienceand received a Juris Doctorate from Hastings College of the Lawin 1972.  He met his wife, Christine,while at Berkeley where sheobtained her BA in English and teaching credential.  They married on July 4, 1971, and movedto Fresno in1973.  Howard was an attorney with Fresno County LegalServices for over 12 years and then with the Office of Fresno County Counsel until hisretirement in 2007.  Howard and his wifehave two grown children—Adam and Robin, and an adorable grandson, Oliver.

          Howardbegan taking photographs in junior high school with a simple Browniecamera.  While he upgraded his cameras overthe years, he did not switch to the digital format until 2004.  His collection of photographs now exceeds 180,000with 120,000 of them on film.  Most ofhis photographs are of people, places, and events in the greater Fresno area.  He is the official photographer for the Fresno County BarAssociation.  He has taken photographsfor the State Bar of California, the California SupremeCourt, and literally hundreds of community organizations, including FresnoMetro Ministry, Friends of the Library, KVPR, and the Ken Maddy Institute.  In 2007, the Mayor of Fresno designatedHoward as the City's current Photo Laureate with Pop Laval being itsfirst.  Several of his photographs havereceived art show awards.

          Influencedby the historic Pop Laval Photographic Archive Collection and encouraged byothers, Howard decided to partner with the Henry Madden Library at CSU Fresno andthe Fresno Regional Foundation to raise the money needed to digitize hisphotographic collection with the goal of making it a database accessible by thegeneral public through the Internet. Howard will be devoting his time to indexing the photographs over thenext 10+ years.  Current photographs andinformation on the Photo Archive Project are at his personal website at .

          Howardis also an active member of our community. He has received many awards for his work, including the Fresno CountyBar Association's Bernie Witkin Lifetime Achievement Award, the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Community Service Award fromthe City of Fresno, and a Commendation from the Legion of ValorMuseum.  He currently serves as Presidentof the Board of Trustees of his church.