Doug's Gym: The Last of Its Kind

Photos and Introduction by Norm Diamond
Essay by Roy Flukinger
112 pp., 67 color photos
Kehrer Verlag publisher, 2019 (Europe), 2020 (U.S.)

Doug’s was a place frozen in time. Virtually nothing had changed since its first day in business.

After 55 years, Doug’s closed. And when that happened, Diamond found something else: a quiet reminder that regardless of how hard we push and how tight our grip, we must, eventually, let go.

Diamond’s new collection ....is a bighearted photo book that walks the line between elegy and celebration.
— Bill Shapiro, Texas Monthly, former Editor-in-Chief of Life Magazine
Photographer Norm Diamond comes to photography after four decades considering mortality as an Interventional radiologist. This remarkable perspective of facing death and loss is reflected in themes that continue to interest him, but most importantly, Norm has a profound understanding of the human experience and the transience of person and a place.
— Aline Smithson, Lenscratch
At Doug’s Gym you couldn’t watch TV while walking the treadmill because there were no TVs—or treadmills. There were no ellipticals, no heart-rate monitors, no hot yoga. There was no air-conditioning. There were, however, dumbbells, kettlebells, and barbells—row after row of them—a few bench press set-ups and a leg press, a boxing ring, a heavy bag, and a handful of plug-in fans, most of which worked.
— Bill Shapiro, Texas Monthly, former Editor-in-Chief of Life Magazine