Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1999/01/04

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Subject: Re: [Leica] Value Added and Nazi Cameras
From: "dan states" <dstate1@hotmail.com>
Date: Mon, 04 Jan 1999 08:10:00 PST

I have read recently that Leica is one of the companies being sued for 
compensation by decendants of prisoners that were used as slave labor 
during the war, along with Volkswagen.  This is quite disturbing to me.  
If in fact this did occur I would find it vulgar to collect equipment 
made under such conditions for monetary enrichment.  It would also 
reflect very poorly on the Leitz family.  Does anyone have more detailed 
knowledge of this accusation?  (sorry if I am re hashing a subject, I am 
new to the group)



>
>As a Jew and a Leica user, I have thought about these matters.  One 
thing
>that would certainly makes me uneasy is if there is value added created 
for
>an object simply because it has a Nazi connection.  I suppose one can 
test
>this by comparing a Nazi camera with a non-Nazi camera of equal rarity 
and
>see which one commands the higher price from collectors.  However, I am 
not
>a collector, so I cannot comment on the many vagaries that go into
>determining the price a collector is willing to pay for a particular 
item.
>
>I should ask my father, a Jew who fought the Japanese, if it ever made 
him
>uncomfortable back in the early Sixties that I bought both German and
>Japanese equipment?  I suppose not since he bought his first Volks 
Wagon
>when Hitler had been dead only ten years.
>
>	Buzz Hausner
>


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