E.R. Beardsley has a long and varied career that includes teaching stints at the University of California, Riverside where he was also Dean of the Division of Fine Arts in the College of Humanities, founder and first director of the internationally renown California Museum of Photography, and Special Assistant to the Chancellor for Cultural Affairs.
Mr. Beardsley has also taught at California State University, Fullerton, Scripps College, Claremont, and University of Oregon, Eugene. He currently teaches a history of technology course at the University of LaVerne.
Mr. Beardsley has been a journalist, writing stories on everything from right-wing para-military organizations to the environment. He was for a time the owner of a digital design company, a partner in the publication of a non-profit e-journal dedicated to the arts, humanities, and social sciences. He continues to work now and then as a video producer, a painter and printmaker, and a writer of short stories and essays. In his youth he served three years in the Army Security Agency in Europe, and at various times undertook extensive investigations of the landscapes and biota of the Pacific Northwest and California.
Mr. Beardsley is one of the founders of the Riverside Arts Foundation, served as a member of the Working Group for the Digital Image and the International Museum of Photography at George Eastman House, served as a member of grant panels at the National Endowment for the Arts, and was invited to be considered for the post of White House Liason for the Arts and Humanities during the Carter Administration (declined so as to not further excite my ulcer).
