I grew up in Rochester, Michigan where I competed in football, basketball and track. My father was the local town photographer, though at that early age, my interest was only in sports.

College started at Port Huron Junior College before going on to Michigan State University. At M.S.U. I learned to play the old Indian game of Lacrosse, which then was a very obscure sport. Our players purchase our wood sticks from the Indians in upstate New York. The Onondaga Indians made each wood stick by hand, and every stick had a different feel. MSU gave Varsity status to the club lacrosse team after 1969, a team on which I played. I was an assistant coach that first year, and became the head lacrosse coach at M.S.U. the second and third years. 

I migrated to Florida in 1973 where I helped the University of Miami start their lacrosse program. After living in South Florida for 20 straight years I began to split time between Florida and Saugatuck, Michigan where I now reside full time. Though my father was a professional photographer in Rochester for 40 years, I had no interest in photography. That is until 2001 when I picked up a camera, and haven’t put it down. 

My images have been featured in USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, Cond’e Naste, Conservation International, Florida Lacrosse News. Michigan Runner, Michigan Live, The Oakland Press, Fort Lauderdale  Sun Sentinel, and Michigan State University. My photography has won awards from the Michigan Historical Society and the West Michigan Land Conservancy among others.

I am proud to have developed  www.PicturesForVets.org a nonprofit through which I have placed close to 300 color prints in the Michigan and Florida Veterans Homes. A new Veterans Facility opened in Chesterfield Township outside of Detroit in 2022, and the same year the Grand Rapid’s Veterans Home opened a 128 room addition. If you would like to help me place Healing Artwork on the walls where our War Heroes live please click on the green button below.  

Ted Swoboda
70 Wiley Road # 3
Fennville, Mi 49408
954 881.2937