The Collection Begins

Over the years I've owned numerous cameras, from Instamatics to 35 mm SLR's - yes, even a Colorburst instant camera. But it was only by accident that I began a collection.

Sometime in the mid 1990's, my wife and I were at a Flea Market when I saw an old Instamatic 20, complete in it's original box. It was for sale for only $1.00 (that's Canadian), check the top left corner of the box. So, I bought it. Not with any grand idea of starting a collection, but just because I thought that it was interesting and I liked it.

The camera seemed to be in pretty good shape, and as you can see, the box was in good shape for its years. And heck, it was only a buck!

It even had the owners manual!!! How cool is that?

Of couse, the film and the flash cube that came with the camera had been used many years previous. But the film for this camera was still available then - maybe still - and I bought one and put into it. In the photo below, you can see it through the window in the rear.

Also, while telling a friend about it, he told me he thought he might have some old flash cubes at home, if he can find them, he'd give them to me. As it turned out, he found a package of 3 cubes. I'll take some pictures of them and add them to a later post.

So, that's how it began. Since then, friends and relatives have been giving me their old junk . . . er, cameras and related stuff. And of course, I've found a number of items at flea markets and yard sales.

Spammed!!!

It would be nice to get some feedback on my blog, but so far, almost all I've received has been

!!! SPAM !!!

I have reluctantly enabled the Word Verification option that Blogger provides. I appologize for the inconvenience and hope that this will not deter anyone from submitting legitimate comments.

Thank you.

My First Camera

By the following summer I had saved enough to buy my own camera. Of course I had help from my grandmother . . . (SHHH! No one is supposed to know.)

It was a Kodak Brownie Holiday. I remember very clearly, that it cost $4.95 (Canadian, which at that time was worth more than the US dollar!). However, I didn't have the foresight at that age to keep it for posterity, and don't remember what happened to it.

I used that Holiday camera for a few years and still have some photos (black and white of course) dated as late as 1959.

For those of you who don't remember, the pictures would come back from the "drug store" in a little yellow Kodak booklet like the one below.

Inside would be your pictures, like this one of me.

If you can't make out the date on the right edge of this one it's February 1957.

Of course, it's summer in the picture, but you see, I couldn't afford film and developing all at once, so the developing had to wait until the funds were available, so this picture was taken in the summer of 1956.

The "Anniversary" Kodak

My first camera, pictured to the left, really wasn't my camera. It was my fathers.

At the 50th anniversary of the Eastman Kodak Company, in 1930, fifty thousand of these box cameras were given away, together with one roll of film. If you were 12 years old in 1930 you could get one of these cameras. My father, born in 1918, received one. All the cameras were sold in a few days.

This was the only camera in the house when I was a boy, and when I was about 8-years old in the mid 1950's, I was allowed to use it. The pictures were clear and sharp, and black& white of course.

I still have that camera and as far as I know, it still works. It's very basic in operation, having no lens, just an aperture and a spring loaded dual action shutter; a little lever on the right side at the front that you push down for one picture and up for the next.

Below are some current pictures of the camera.

This is the label identifying it as the "Anniversary" model

Note the red window on the back for the print number to be viewed.

Note the label on the inside

Close-up of inside label

What Is CAMEROSITY

In the early 1940's, Kodak came up with a code for dating their products. This is a literal code based on the word "CAMEROSITY" AS FOLLOWS:

C - A - M - E - R - O - S - I - T - Y

1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 0

Although this method of determining a manufacture date isn't used on all cameras, it's the most accurate method, when it can be used.

The code may be stamped or etched in a variety of places, either inside the camera stamped on the film holder, or etched around the lens, resembling a serial number.

Example 1: RS5665. The "RS" would correspond to "R"=5 and "S"=7 which would indicate that this camera was made in 1957.

Example 2: Inside a Brownie Hawleye Flash Model that I have in my collection, the code is the following 4 digit code: "YSET". Using this code to translate these letters to numbers result in "0745", or 07/45, meaning that this camera was manufactured in July of 1945.

The last date above, however, is not entirely correct. Kodak used a fixed 4-week period, rather than a monthly period that can be 28 to 31 days. therefore, the date in Example 2, is the seventh 4-week period of 1945.