Re: [Leica] My crime and punishment and a story (Long)

[Steve Rigby <steve_rigby@yahoo.com>]

Bruce, that's a great story.

- --- MicroGrid@aol.com wrote:
> Sal,
> 
> Sentance delivered and served. We don need no
> steenken black tape here!
> 
> Actually your punishment reminds me of an old
> customer from my days selling 
> Leicas. Mrs/ Witzeman (RIP) was an optometrist with
> coke bottle glasses. She 
> and her husband, also an optometrist, worked very
> hard for years and when 
> they retired early they started to travel the world.
> That's when I met her. 
> She came in to my store, walked up to me peered at
> me through her thick 
> glasses and wanted the camera with the "best
> viewfinder" I worked with her 
> for a long time trying to get her to see the
> rangefinder spot through an M4, 
> but she could not. then she pointed down to a
> Leicaflex SL, And said "what 
> about that?". Well, boy, could she see through that!
> Meter needles, focusing 
> aid, all perfect. She bought two of them, and a 35
> and a 90. and off she 
> went. She came back a week later to bring in some
> film. She had both cameras 
> hanging from her neck on the OEM straps. They were
> clanging together like 
> church bells, and looked it! I adjusted the straps
> and we looked at her 
> pictures. My goodness could this woman shoot!!
> 
> Her husband passed away shortly after that, but Mrs.
> Witzeman continued to 
> travel shoot pictures.
> 
> She was out shooting more than anyone I knew at the
> time, and her cameras 
> showed it. When something would fall off one of
> them, she would bring it in 
> to me, get it fixed, and give it and an equally
> beatup lens to a grandkid or 
> a friends kid. She tried many other brands, but she
> either could not see 
> through them, or the 11 X 14's weren't good enough.
> she always came back to 
> Leica. Her cameras and lenses may have been beat,
> but I never saw her with a 
> dirty lens. Maybe on a trip to Vancouver she showed
> Ted her secret underwear 
> trick.
> 
> She would come back form a trip with 30 rolls of
> film, and then bring in the 
> 3.5 X 5's and we'd pore over the negatives to try to
> match up the ones for 
> enlargements. Her house and her friends' were
> covered with 11 X 14's of their 
> travels. Have you ever tried to find "the" negative
> among 72 others of 
> the"one" cactus flower!
> 
> One time I got a call form her, she had fallen down
> a mountain in Switzerland 
> and destroyed her brand new SL2 and a 28 Elmarit.
> She was in a hospital. She 
> wanted another camera and lens. 
> 
> I used to cringe everytime she would walk into the
> store with thousands of 
> 1960-70 $$ clunking around her neck. But I bit my
> tongue and never suggested 
> an neveready case. Something inside told me that she
> would say "posh, they're 
> just cameras..Hmmm... What's that lens do?".
> 
> I am probably giving you the impression of a
> doddering old spendthrift. She 
> was anything but. She knew the value of a dollar.
> But she knew she had eye 
> problems, and she wanted to take pictures. She
> needed a camera that would let 
> her do that. She knew her cameras were valuable, but
> she wanted the pictures 
> more. 
> 
> I chuckle everytime someone talks about cameras as
> tools and uses a hammer as 
> a metaphor. We used to joke about Mrs. Witzeman's
> cameras AS hammers!
> 
> When I saved up enough to by my first Leica, an M5,
> I didn't buy a case. 
> 
> Bruce Bowman
> Killingworth CT
> 
> 
> In a message dated 6/1/00 7:53:32 AM Eastern
> Daylight Time, 
> sdmp007@pressroom.com writes:
> 
> << Bruce,
>          The punishment for your "crime" is to
> remove all black tape from
>  your Leicas and to allow them to become nicked and
> worn!!! >>


__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Send instant messages & get email alerts with Yahoo! Messenger.
http://im.yahoo.com/