My guess the name Larry Spraker doesn’t need much of an introduction across the New York State and New England GIS landscape. His work and contributions since the late 1980s to the geospatial community are many and have included efforts from academia, government, and for many years the private sector. As well as a ton of volunteer work with GIS user groups and the like. It has been an privilege crossing paths with him in so many ways over the years.
So depending on the time of day, I recommend grabbing your favorite beverage, pull up a chair and continue reading. There’s a lot here. And after you are done, close your eyes and envision Mr. Spraker in another time or comos. Or, as the immortal Rod Sterling would say on the Twilight Zone “Another Dimension”. Under the bright lights, behind the desk, and waving his hands fevorishly. Yup, that’s him in his new gig – performing his best Chris Berman “Swami Sez” imitation as he hosts the 6PM ESPN SportsCenter broadcast.
Enjoy.
eSpatiallyNewYork: Let’s start from the beginning. The Albany-area boy goes to SUNY Albany for undergraduate and then on to Indiana State for graduate work. How and when did geography become your educational and professional focus?
Spraker: I originally went to UAlbany as a Communications major with aspirations to be a sportswriter. After realizing that was a tough gig that didn’t pay particularly well (at least back in the early 80’s), someone recommended Computer Science. After a few courses, I really liked programming, but hated the high-end math courses such as Calculus and Differential Equations. A minor in Computer Science didn’t require the math courses, so I went to my advisor and asked “What would be a good major with a Computer Science minor?”. He listed a number of majors that included Physics, Math, and the last one he mentioned was Geography. I had already taken 6 credits in Geography as electives, so I asked for more details and somehow this guy had a fair bit of knowledge in this area and explained just enough of cartography, GIS and remote sensing to pique my interest. I registered for Intro to Cartography and Intro to Remote Sensing the next semester and fell in love with the both courses, and quickly found my new major. I focused primarily in Remote Sensing as an undergrad, and my professor, Floyd Henderson, really encouraged me to go graduate school. At the time Indiana State University was a leading remote sensing program, having the first remote terminals into the mainframe computers at Purdue which was the state of the art for image processing software. Floyd knew the professors at ISU, wrote me a recommendation and helped me get a Research Assistantship, so I packed up my car with everything I owned and drove to Terre Haute, Indiana for 2 years and finished my Masters. Although I focused a lot on Remote Sensing, I got exposed to a lot of GIS as well, and by the end of grad school had really got the GIS bug.
As an aside, after I graduated from ISU and came back to the Capital District, Floyd called me and asked me if I would teach his Intro to Remote Sensing and Aerial Photo Interpretation classes while he was away on sabbatical that year. So I returned to SUNY Albany as an adjunct professor and taught his classes that year. When Floyd returned, I stayed on as an adjunct faculty member and transitioned to developing and teaching several GIS courses. I really enjoyed working with the students and ended up teaching at SUNY Albany for 17 years.