Tipper Gore
Live Web cast November 29, 1999, 1 p.m. ET

Homelessness

Tipper Gore got her first real camera -- a 35 mm Yashica -- in 1973 from her husband, Vice President Al Gore. Photography soon became not only a hobby but also a part-time profession. Mrs. Gore shot photo essays for the Nashville Tennessean. The newspaper once ran a picture she took of an evicted woman sitting in the rain which prompted townspeople to call into the paper offering to help.

Gore stopped working as a newspaper photographer when her husband was elected to Congress in 1976, but her commitment to helping the homeless has continued to this day. In 1986, she co-founded and chaired Families for the Homeless, a non-partisan partnership of families that raises public awareness of issues related to homelessness. Relying once again on the power of the image, Gore produced Homeless in America, a photography exhibit which toured the nation with assistance from the National Mental Health Association (NMHA). She is currently working on a 10-year retrospective of the exhibit.

Gore's work has also focused on mental illness, AIDS, Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, lead poisoning and physical fitness for children. In all aspects of her social work, she prefers to work with people one-on-one. "If you never do more than write a check, if you never connect directly with the people you want to help," she writes, "you will do some good, but you will never feel as fulfilled as you will if you take the time to forge a real relationship."