Michael Williamson is a staff photographer for The Washington Post. Thirty years ago he was working for the Sacramento Bee when he began a project with a reporter named Dale Maharidge. Together they published a book called "Journey to Nowhere:the Saga of the New Underclass."
Three decades and a half a million miles later their collaboration continues. Their latest effort, "Someplace Like America: Tales from the New Great Depression" continues the story they first began to cover so many years ago.
In this interview, the first of a two part conversation, Williamson describes how this project came about and how the deindustrialization of America continues to have an adverse impact on millions.