Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1995/11/29
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]> >Aren't most collectors actually users too? > >------------------------------------------------------------------------------ >Gordon Banks N3JXP |"If you can not find truth right where you are, >geb@cadre.dsl.pitt.edu | where do you expect to find it?" --Dogen >------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > no. i was a user in the late 40s with my IIIc brought back from germany after the war. it came with a 35mm, 90mm and 135mm too, all bought new from the factory in wetzlar. but i had to sell the system to go through graduate school: $1000 + a super ikonta b, which was a reasonable trade at that time. i used the zeiss, which is also a remarkable camera, till i needed something smaller and with easier close focussing, so i picked up a retina IIc while in europe in 1959, and used it till 1966. i was a backpacker at that time, so i needed a light, yet expendable slr for flower, bird and mountain photography. i bought a spotmatic system, and used it for almost 25 years, then gradually stopped backpacking (age and disability) and thus phtographing things. but during that period i became a collector, and among the things i collected, both from local newspaper ads and usenet offerings: a I(C) converted to II(D) (serial number under 50,000), a IIf, IIIf, IIIc, IIIg, and lots of screw mount lenses, and a double stroke M3, with a full set of lenses. no doubt, if i were to go back to actual phtography, i would try them all, as i would try my contax IIa, IIIa, etc. but, not going to the mountains any more means that i don't forsee a return to actually taking pictures. as it is, i can enjoy my riches like a miser in his counting house counting out his gold. it seems funny, but once the collecting bug bites, one becomes very strange! the assertion that leicas need to be exercised to keep the shutter going is false, by the way. all of my screw mount equipment was CLA-ed by john van steltin (best leica repairman i know of) and put in optimal working order (all missing parts replaced, etc. - he is very good). since then, whenever i check one, the shutter stays in perfect operating order, no slow speed stickiness. it may help that i live in colorado in near desert conditions. humidity is the enemy of metal, and of other parts as well.