Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1999/04/26

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Subject: Re: [Leica] Points to ponder....
From: Marc James Small <msmall@roanoke.infi.net>
Date: Mon, 26 Apr 1999 10:31:30 -0400

At 09:08 AM 4/26/99 -0400, Dan Post wrote:
> I believe Victor Hasselblad was an
>ornithologist who wanted a camera suited for photographing birds, Ernst
>Leitz liked to hike and and take pictures, but got tire of carrying a large
>view camera- that's the story I heard, and prevailed on Barnack to adapt a
>motion picture film exposure tester to be used as a small camera.

Well, not really, on either.

Victor Hasselblad owned the family business, the Swedish Kodak agency.  He
began producing aerial recon cameras for the Swedish military and was, late
in the war, prevailed to develop the German HK12.5 camera for use by the
German military.  The war ended, and he had the basis for what became the
Hasselblad 1600F.  He was a noted amateur bird-watcher, but I doubt if this
had much impact on the design of the camera:  Victor was also a cadgey
businessman and was primarily interested in producing a successful, and
profitable, camera design.

As to the birth of the Leica, Barnack was the hiker, not Ernst Leitz.
Barnack also was asthmatic, and the weight of a field camera was more than
he was willing to lug around.  The story of the "movie film tester", while
hoary with age, is most improbable:  Barnack himself denied this, in
writing, though, late in his own life, Theo Kisselbach claimed that Barnack
had admitted its truth.  It seems far more probable that Barnack, having
been exposed to the titanic improvements in cine emulsions by his friend,
Emil Mechau (Barnack was a microscope shop foreman, not a photography dude,
though he did take a lot of pictures himself!), thought up the idea of
using these new emulsions to produce a light-weight camera which he could
take around on his woodland jaunts.

(Another interesting tid-bit is that Barnack left Zeiss because they
wouldn't put him on the corporate health-insurance plan due to his having a
"pre-existing condition":  Ernst Leitz II agreed to pay the extra freight,
and the rest is history.  It is NOT true that Barnack attempted to hawk the
original Leica to ICA:  Barnack was MOST unhappy at being transferred by
Zeiss to ICA, as he had little interest in working on cameras.)

Marc

msmall@roanoke.infi.net  FAX:  +540/343-7315
Cha robh bas fir gun ghras fir!