The DeSollar Studio that provides communications services is a relatively new enterprise but as a business, DeSollar Studio has been around for over 40 years.

The original was a photographic studio owned and operated by Karen DeSollar's parents in Beardstown, Illinois. Begun in 1961, the business operated until 1998 when Kenneth DeSollar, Karen's father, developed Parkinson's disease. He died in 2005.

"My parents worked together in the business," Karen says. "They had completely opposite 'skill sets,' but they complemented each other very well. My dad was the photographer and took all of the pictures. The studio was next to our house and he had a darkroom, where in the early days of the business, he developed all of the black and white photography himself. My mother, (Irene) took care of the business side and was the face of the business to the public. She also was part of the whole picture-taking experience. When someone would come in for a studio appointment, she would stand next to the camera, and to my father, and work to coax a smile out of them. She was really good at it. She never learned how to take pictures and he never learned how to entertain. They were a study in opposites, but together they made a whole."

Being in a small town in the MIdwest, they provided every kind of photography—children's portraits, graduation ceremonies,weddings, gun and passport IDs, you name it. Kenneth was also a stringer photographer for the Springfield Journal-Register newspaper. In their 40 years in business, they compiled a virtual photographic record of families and news events in their part of Illinois.

"When I got old enough," Karen remembers, "sixth or seventh grade, my mother gave me the job of assembling wedding albums. (I got paid $1 each.) So I learned early how to identify negatives, catalog images and put a story together visually. It is experience that has served me well."

"When it came time to create my own business, and especially after my dad passed away, to give my business the same name as my parents' was a way to carry on the tradition and to honor them. The technology and procedures have changed so much, but the concept of communicating and storytelling is similar. It just seemed like a natural."

To read more about Kenneth DeSollar, visit Karen's tribute page.