[Leica] Another Leica story.

[InfinityDT@aol.com]

When I was about 12, my father knew a very elderly, extremely wealthy and 
*very* eccentric gentleman who had no family, drove a 40 year-old (at that 
time) Packard and owned a huge house which was full of relics of all sorts: 
Boxes full of new shirts still in the wrapping, rows of brand-new shoes, 
piles of unopened mail on the kitchen table with unknown numbers of uncashed 
dividend checks therein--you get the picture.  Included was a set of Leicas, 
2 IIIg bodies and six lenses including a *screwmount* 35 Summicron and 
screw-thread *rigid* 50 Summicron.  These were still in their boxes and had 
not been used once.  The gentleman's eyesight was failing and he knew I was 
into photography so he gave the set to my father to let me examine, and said 
if I wanted it he'd sell it to me.  Well, my father figured that rich as the 
old fellow was, he meant to basically let me just keep it or maybe ask a few 
bucks for it just for goodwill, so after I'd had the Leicas for a couple 
months and was hopelessly in love with it, my father asked the man how much 
he wanted.  The reply was a figure slightly in excess of what a new (at that 
time) kit would have cost, so my father politely but hurriedly returned the 
Leicas to his acquaintance.  Six months later while the fellow was out 
shopping,  his house (Leicas and all) burned to the ground.   

But, in the spirit of "good-things-come-to-those-who-wait", about a year 
later I inherited a set of LTM Leicas from a family friend (not as 
"collectible" as the first set but of course that wasn't much of a passtime 
back then) and I have that kit to this day.   (I also still have my first set 
of Nikons which a friend  purchased for me in Tokyo on R&R near the end of 
the Vitenam war.  The box containing the brand-new FTn, F2 and 7 lenses 
arrived stateside about a month after the box containing his body.  Wouldn't 
trade those Nikons for Leicas.)

DT