Missouri Militia – by Katie Currid

Katie Currid just finished her sophomore year and photographed a story on the Missouri Militia for her final project for Electronic Photojournalism.

I wanted to do a story on the Missouri Militia in response to the MIAC report by the Missouri State Highway Patrol which categorized militias in Missouri as terrorist organization. As stories often do, my angle changed once the MIAC report was discredited, and I began to focus on the mission and purpose of the Missouri Militia. As I continued to work with these men, I realized the militia was not a hyper-conservative, militant organization exercising their rights to free speech as I first expected, but a community-oriented group seeking to help the state in cases of natural disasters. I learned a lot while reporting this story, especially with issues such as dealing with my own biases as I grew to know the men I was working with and also learning to adjust stories when finding something better. I also put together a Flash project for this piece, incorporating Flash, audio and photographs into a 4-chapter story.

Check out more photos and the Flash presentation on Katie’s blog.