Posted by Les on March 28, 2001 at 13:43:29:
In Reply to: Re: Information needed on an Auto Graflex around 1900 posted by Les on March 28, 2001 at 13:10:13:
After double checking serial number on my cameras I saw something I overlooked in your post. That being F&S Rochester, NY.
This solves the anachronism of an Auto Graflex from 1900.
F&S ws still making and selling cameras in Manhattan when
they were sold. When it came time to move to Rochester a lot of
these partially assembled cameras (along with a lot of raw
stock)
was moved along with the machines and some of the labor, including
Mr. Folmer.
There are no hard a fast rules here, but I've seen cameras and
bag mags with two labels from this time-- "Manufactured by Eastman
Kodak, successor to Folmer & Schwing, Rochester New York"
And your plate, "Folmer & Schwing, Rochester, NY"
I'm not sure which came first. It's possible that Mr. Eastman allowed F&S to run on it's own for a while assembling the last of the New York (city) cameras and then added the common 'successor to" to later cameras.
In my previous post I was thinking my 1899/1900 RB graphic was serial number 8xxx, but in fact it was 48xx.
In Mr. Paine's book he states:
"Contributing toward this quality, the (variable aperture) focal
plane shutter introduced in the Graflex Camera (1901-1902) was
considered inheriently pictorical because it underexposed the sky.
However, it would prove troublesome and was replaced by the
one-piece multi-aperture curtain in the Auto Graflex Shutter of
1906."
According to this, your camera shouldn't have a variable
aperture shutter. So this must be a very early version of the Auto
Graflex and I suspecet the "Patent Applied" was for the new
shutter.
: Les