User:Rickbender28

My full name is Richard Bender. I was born in East Cleveland, Ohio in the USA. I spent my life in Northeast Ohio living near the shores of Lake Erie. My hometown is located in an eastern suburb of Cleveland, Ohio called Wickliffe where I've lived much of my life. I have two children, and a grandson.

I was raised Catholic and attended Catholic schools. As a teenager, I worked as a musician in local bands. I considered myself an artist with creative tendencies and worked my way through college in a somewhat successful nightclub band called with other students from CSU. I studied music at Cleveland State University attending the School for Arts and Sciences. I became interested in photography while attending CSU. I changed my studies from music to graphic arts and photography in 1973 when I enrolled in graphic arts studies at Lakeland Community College. I was married in 1976 and took my time completing my schooling. I later graduated with honors and a business degree in graphic design and certificate in multimedia. I've worked as a successful musician, photographer, prepress technician, marketing professional, multimedia videographer, and tree nursery owner. My strongest skills are tied to photography and printing where I've worked for for more than 40 years. Since 1986, I've been creating and manipulating digital files with high-end systems and Adobe products. I took to designing websites in the 1990s. All these skills contributed to and were useful in developing a career in marketing that I began in 2005 with a startup media company. That helped me to land positions with a couple of corporations in and around Cleveland, Ohio.

I also have interests in real estate, home building, and construction that manifested while developing rural properties as a lifetime personal hobby. I live on a tree farm today. I developed it as my place for retreat and retirement.