Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1996/10/11
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]To all: This is a copy of a message I sent to another list this morning after I learned of the passing of Bob Schwalberg. He was intimately involved with Leica for some time and many of you will remember him for his brilliant articles done for decades for POPULAR PHOTOGRAPHY Magazine.... ++++++++++++++++ I am so sorry and deeply saddened to learn today that Bob Schwalberg died. He was a pioneer and one-of-a-kind. No one growing up and entering photography in the 1950s-1970s had a complete education without reading Bob s brilliant and often very funny articles on just about everything related to our profession. His major works of course were for POPULAR PHOTOGRAPHY. But he left that magazine for several years and worked for Leitz in Wetzlar. Neither Leica nor Bob ever got over it. Bob tried to bring Leitz into the 20th century and Leitz worked diligently to convince Bob that SLRs could never work because they would never be able to be as accurate as rangefinders. Oh, the stories he could tell. His long one with perfect German accent about the Fokker plane still breaks me up when I recall our train ride from Photokina in Koln back to Wetzlar. Photography is so much the loser without Bob. He loved it, and lived it completely. A great writer about photography. What a rare and wonderful combination. I did not realize how much I missed seeing him until I read of his passing today. There will not likely be another like him. Fred Ward