The Things He Gave Me and The Things I Took is a daughter’s unflinching look at the life of her curmudgeonly adoptive father, Cliff, a man who loved the land and keeping track of things. It is a story about loss and things left behind, from Cliff’s unfulfilled dreams to the humble possessions he treasured and passed on to Ann for safekeeping.

Cliff was awarded a full athletic scholarship to attend college, but his parents wouldn’t let him go. They needed him on their Iowa farm. A year later he left and spent years roaming around the west, taking photographs and agricultural jobs along the way to pay for his travels. Later, when he would recount stories of his time in the west, his body language and voice would change, and even as a child, Ann could tell this was the happiest time in his life.

Like many working-class men before him, Cliff was intent on giving his children what he was unable to have, a college education. He obsessively recorded his income, expenses, investments, and savings in hand-written logbooks. Ultimately, it was not his savings but a tragic accident — the loss of his right eye — that paid for Ann’s education in the visual arts.

Though Cliff was increasingly dismayed by his educated daughter’s independence and willful nature, the two were tethered together by their mutual love of photography and growing things. In his later years, an aging Cliff entrusted Ann with his most treasured possessions, objects he had saved from his time in the west — keepsakes that were a reminder of the man he once was.

Ann Fessler is known for her visual work and non-fiction writing that uses individual stories as a microcosm to speak about broader human issues. In this case, she uses Cliff’s life story to talk about generational legacy, keepsakes as a reflection of our values and identity, and vernacular books as containers of family and cultural history. Cliff’s story is meant to probe questions such as:

• How do we measure the life of an ordinary man?
• What is the impact of a parent’s unfulfilled dreams on the lives of their children?
• What role do photographs play in the stories we tell ourselves about who we are, or were?
• Whose stories are worthy of being recorded and preserved in archives/museums?
• What might amateur photographs contribute to the historic record?
• What is the difference between an object and a photograph in relation to memory and history?
• What is our responsibility for a parent’s treasured possessions after they pass away?

This book is the eighth artist’s book by Fessler. All of her books reference existing book forms, primarily books intended to educate, such as manuals, textbooks, and reference books.

The Things He Gave Me and The Things I Took
Copyright © Ann Fessler, 2025
Photographs by Clifford Fessler and Ann Fessler
Designed and printed by Ann Fessler
Bookbinding and custom boxes by Amy Borezo
Book dimensions: 9¼” x 7⅝” x 1⅛”
112 full size pages, 24 smaller interior pages

Edition of 9, plus 1 artist’s proof
Each book is housed in a unique clamshell box,
designed to hold one of Cliff’s treasured possessions.

The book weaves together Ann’s writing about growing up with Cliff, with photographs her father made throughout his life. It includes pages from books passed down through the family — Cliff’s mother’s German hymnal and her Bible, stuffed with obits of dead relatives and newspaper articles about Cliff’s athletic triumphs. It also includes pages from Cliff’s hand-written financial logbooks and Ann’s baby book with an empty family tree.