Photographers see a lot. Daniel Shular, who's on staff at Tulsa World, has seen violence and extremism. He's been knocked down, shot at, and even arrested while documenting civil unrest. In light of growing protests in Tulsa and across the country, KWGS' Elizabeth Caldwell sat down with Shular to talk about some of his work. Listen above or read below for a transcript of their conversation.
ELIZABETH CALDWELL: Welcome to the studio, Daniel.
DANIEL SHULAR: Thanks for having me.
EC: So you've taken some pretty famous photographs, and you were at the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville in 2017. And you were also in Missouri in 2020 when a group of protesters marched on the mayor's house and were met with a couple of counter protesters waving guns. And, I can almost see the photograph of those two people, the McCloskeys.
The woman, I remember her shirt. The woman is wearing a black and white striped shirt, and the man is wearing a pink polo. And she has a pistol. Right? And he has a longer a longer gun?
DS: Yeah. Yeah.
EC: Yeah. And you've done some other projects around protests and extremism too. And, I wanna ask you, like, some personal questions.
So, is there anyone who who loves you, who wishes you would stop doing this kind of stuff? Because in that McCloskey photo, one of them, she's got her finger on the trigger, and she's pointing the gun at people. So I wondered, you know, who who in your life is like, please stop doing this?
DS: My parents. They don't like it.
But most people in my life, for better or worse, kind of encourage it. So I I keep doing it, I guess.
DS: How do your parents, like, what do they say?
DS: Oh, they just they don't think it's worth it for me being in any danger to to take photos. They want me to just, you know, kinda do a normal day job version of journalism.
EC: Well, if that exists. But how did, so how did you get into it then? I mean, they're your parents. They bred you. So how did you gain an interest in doing extreme stuff?
DS: Well, I was going doing my undergrad at University of Missouri, Saint Louis, and I was graduating in 2014. And I I lived in Ferguson while I was in school, and I actually had lived across the street from, the Ferguson Police Department. So a couple months after I graduated, the protests started, and I was just kind of looking for jobs, and I had really gotten an interest away from doing art photography, because that's what my undergrad degree is in, into doing journalism. And so I just kinda threw myself into it at that point.
Just going out, taking pictures, kind of trial by fire, learning how to do journalism, with no real background.
EC: Oh, so you're kind of a refugee from the art world then?
DS: Yeah.
EC: Well, why do you keep doing it? Do you feel like you're, I know that people kinda get addicted to these extreme situations. So I wondered if that was the case with you.
DS: I just, I think I get bored easily. And I've always had, like, an interest in politics and photography and all those things kind of meet up in that sort of work when you're in it. I don't do as much of it now. Now that I have a day job, a normal job, I guess, at the Tulsa World.
But, it still happens. Sometimes we get some really exciting stories, but, I don't do it as much anymore.
EC: Right. And has there been a time when you were taking these kinds of photographs that you were really scared?
DS: Oh, yeah.
Plenty of times. I've been with a group of people that was shot at in Ferguson. I was arrested in 2017 during a protest in St. Louis. In Charlottesville, after the car drove through the crowd, I had actually been coming out of a parking garage and I saw the car pass by us.
I had no idea what happened, but immediately, I was like something terrible has happened. A car is all smashed up. It's got blood on it. And I could hear people screaming. So situations like that, like in the moment, they don't really feel that scary, but once I guess, my brain catches up to what's happening after it's over, that's when it kinda hits you.
EC: Wow. Tell us about the arrest.
DS: So in 2017, an officer was acquitted of shooting Anthony Lamar Smith. It was an older case, but it had been brought back to trial. And there's new evidence, but he was acquitted, and so there are protests.
And I'd missed the first sort of week of protests. I was doing a freelance job in Washington, DC, and I come back. And I kinda thought things might have calmed down. And I got in a car with some protesters. They didn't tell me where we were going, and they stopped on the highway, and they're just like, everybody get out.
So they shut down the highway for a few minutes, and then everybody walked off the highway. And when everyone walked off the highway, the police kettled everybody. And, yeah. I spent, 17, 18 hours in jail in St. Louis City, after that.
EC: Who came and got you?
DS: Nobody really. There was, like, a bail fund, and, I'm a member of the National Press Photographers Association, and so they got me legal counsel. But it just seems like people were just kinda let out at random.
EC: Okay.
DS: I just kinda came out, and there's another protest going on when I got out at the jail.
EC: So, I wanna get to, like, what that means for, you know, modern times and today. But the car in Charlottesville, so that one young woman died. Right?
DS: Yes.
EC: And people were hurt, lots of people were hurt.
DS: Yeah. I think I don't remember the official number. I think it was something like 19 people were injured.
EC: And you saw that car. Did you get a shot of it?
DS: I actually, since I was inside, I thought, this group of protesters were going to beat up a group of white supremacists inside this parking garage. So I had my camera set to the dim light inside the parking garage. When I ran outside, I went to take pictures of the car. They just came out just white, blown out. You couldn't see anything.
But after things had calmed down, I drove around Charlottesville, and I found the neighborhood that the car stopped in. So I went and took pictures of it there. But that was long after, like, things had, settled.
EC: Oh my goodness.
Well, what kind of personal toll? Is there any kind of personal toll of taking these photos? Or is it just, you get to a certain point in your career and it's just like, it's my job?
DS: I mean, it probably does something. I mean, eventually it'll catch up to me.
But it's kinda like in the moment, you don't really think about it. I remember Charlottesville is one of the few times. I've never smoked a cigarette in my life. And after that happened, I was with all these reporters and photographers that cover stuff like this, and they all started smoking cigarettes. I'm like, I've never wanted a cigarette more in my life than right now.
So my brain was like, I just need something to cope right now.
EC: Did it help?
DS: No. I didn’t, I didn't smoke. I went to Waffle House and used that to file my photos really fast.
EC: Okay. So in this day and age, when we're seeing increased, and I know you've been covering the protests here in Tulsa too. Right?
DS: Yes.
EC: You’re seeing them get bigger.
DS: Yes. Yes.
EC: I don't wanna misspeak, we have we've had some that have brought thousands of people out now. You know, looking back at certain political situations, last night when I was looking at your photos, I thought about Bill Clinton and how, you know, his scandals seem kinda quaint these days.
And I'm wondering, what what kind of path do you feel that we're on in regards to extremism, if you have an opinion on that?
DS: I'm not really sure because it looks so different than even in, like, 2017, 2016 when I was really following those sort of movements. I feel like they’ve gone a lot more underground. They're kinda used to using more, like, different apps to to kinda hide what they're doing. It's not as public.
It's not as easy to follow. And I I don't follow it like I used to. So I'm not, like, as on top of it I used to as I used to be. I would say, like, the the protests now are are definitely different than than the ones I was covering before. I don't think they're as extreme.
But nationwide, I I don't really know. I don't wanna say, how the those types of movements are going just because I'm not totally removed from following it, but I I'm not as as close to it as I was a few years ago.
EC: Why, why so?
DS: Just because the changing nature of it, it's well, I just don't have a lot of of time to do it.
And I'm covering a lot of stuff in Tulsa and Oklahoma. So yeah. That's kinda where my concentration is right now. And it's just, it it gets harder to follow,
EC: Right.
DS: As they they hide in, like encrypted apps and Telegram groups, WhatsApp groups, stuff like that.
It's a lot harder to to get into those sort of groups and follow what's happening.
EC: Right. Well, what's next for you?
DS: Oh, right now, I’m just working as a staff photojournalist at the Tulsa World. I'm still trying to find projects, interesting things around the state.
In the fall, football starts. That's my favorite part of my job now is covering college football, which is also it's pretty exciting. Get kind of the same rush from from doing that as some of the more extreme stuff.
EC: I don't believe that.
DS: But I mean, no one's ever tackled me doing protest stuff, but, I have been hit by a football player.
So I’d say there's still that level of excitement that comes from doing it.
EC: Okay. Well, I'll try to accept that.
DS: Alright.
EC: Well, thank you so much for coming by, Daniel.
DS: Yeah. No problem. Thank you for having me.
