Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2007/07/04
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]On Jul 4, 2007, at 10:07 PM, Marc wrote: > > The minute the War ended, Ernst Leitz II set up > two development teams to develop future camera > designs. One team produced the IIIg and the > other the M3, and the rest is history. Marc, Minor quibble. There were actually three Leica postwar development projects. Willi Stein headed the team which produced the prototype Leica IV in 1935/36. It had a reworked shutter without a slow speed dial, a combined viewfinder/rangefinder, a self timer, provision for finder frames, but still retained the LTM mount and a knob wind. Stein incorporated these features into the postwar M3 but used a bayonet mount and a lever wind. Leica employees referred to the Leica IV as Leica's answer to the Contax II. A second team headed by Adam Wagner was responsible for most of the improvements on the postwar LTM cameras and can be credited with the IIIF and IIIG. But Wagner's real baby was the development of a revolutionary (for Leitz) half frame camera, the Leica-H. This camera was much smaller than the M series, had a lens which retracted into the camera body, and had a full range of features. With the lens retracted it was not much bigger than a pack of cigarettes and was eminently pocketable. The camera was ready for introduction in 1965, just in time to catch the crest of the 1/2 frame wave. However Leica management decided not to produce the camera for fear that it would impact profitable M series sales. (Foreshadowing a similar decision with the CL.) Adam Wagner was so pissed that he resigned after 32 years with Leica. He went to his grave still mad at what he felt was a wrong management decision. All this is documented by Emil Keller, a long term Leica employee, in "The Leica Years." Larry Z