Doug: Two cameras/one old & one new!
Doug - hope this cheers you up a little - I know your interest in historical stories.
This is from a letter I sent to a Texas friend who has an interest in the old time cavalry down on the border in the early part of the 1900's. My wife's grandfather was there so I thought he'd get a kick out of this story. I'm interested in cameras, so this was a perfect (family historical) Christmas gift!
The letter read:
Vic,
Here's some photos of that camera that Mary (Gale's mom) dug out of a trunk family trunk - there are many. Seems that it's Sergeant 'Swanny' (Earl) Swan's old Army camera. He carried it along the Mexican border during 1914 - 1915 and then into Mexico after Pancho Villa in 1916/1917 and later though the First World War - 'Over There' in 1917/1919. I'd give my right arm to talk to the guy ... he passed away in 1959 after 39 years working all of the major studios in Hollywood - 1920-1959 - as a Senior Prop Man.
Story goes, he was mustered out of the cavalry in 1919 and didn't want to cowboy in Texas, so he drifted West to Venice Beach, California, where he met two city slickers in a card game. He was relieving them of their gambling money. One of the two 'rubes' was named Samuel Goldwyn. Seems ole Sam was complaining about old cowboys shooting holes in the local movie houses 'flicker screens!' Seems that Sam had a 'picture studio' over (3 miles east) in Culver City and he was making (bad) one reel westerns ... and he didn't know the difference between McClellan saddle and cowboy saddles! He, nor any of his employees, knew what kinds of guns were used in the Indian Wars ... angry drunken troopers and ex-cowboys were standing up in the middle of their (bad) 'flicker shows' and demanding their nickels back ... sometimes punctuating their outrage with flying bullets at the offending images on the screens!
Swanny said, "Sam, you pay me three dollars a day and I'll straighten out your 'kit,' for you!" He hired Swanny and Swanny kept his end of the bargain - and there was more to it than just saddles - there were pictures, and mirrors over the bars, and the specialized shapes of the period card tables and furniture, etc. Apparently, the next 40 years were quite a ride - one that I'd love to know more about. Some of Swanny's best drinkin' buddies numbered the likes of Earl Flynn, Bill (WC) Fields, Laurence Olivie, Tallulah Bankhead, Jean Harlow, both Barrymores, Clark Gable, Gary Cooper, Will Rogers, Chaplin, Keaton and probably a host of others! Mary has a lot of their letters to 'Swanny' Swan.
Anyway, last week I mentioned to my mother-in-law, Mary, that I had bought myself a small pocket camera for convenience sake - I like cameras and would like to have a small one that could fit nicely into my shirt pocket when traveling. I bought a new Nikon S700 - awesome little camera. Mary said that she'd bring Swanny's camera down and give it to me (since I preserve all the familys' history/historical items) - I was delighted!
I had wondered to myself, in passing, last year, while archiving the 260 photos Swanny had taken along the Rio Grande, in the 'Mexican Incursion' and during the Great War what kind of camera he had used. I just couldn't imagine a cavalry sergeant lugging around even a smaller box camera. I didn't know they had any cameras that were smaller than the old Kodak box cameras - they did - it was called the Vest Pocket Kodak.
Today I've been marveling at the simplistic engineering that went into it - first sold in 1912, they were manufactured until 1926 - an amazing 1.8 million were sold!
See URLs below.
1.
http://www.cosmonet.org/camera/vestan_e.htm
2.
http://www.cosmonet.org/camera/verito_e.htm
I put my new Nikon in the picture to compare them. It's amazing how far we came in the last 95 years! ... and it's amazing how well those great great grandfather cameras did riding into battle after battle, year after year with the U.S. Cavalry! The wear on the brown carrying case shows it's spent a lot of time in the calvary, too!
Mary also brought me his Ft. Riley Cavalry Book - 1916 - which has hundreds of fascinating photos of the fort's various functions, men and officers. It's a great snapshot of calvery history!
There are a few more of Swanny's books up in Venice that I want to see and bring back with me next week when we pass through there as we drive up to Santa Barbara.
We've have his M1911 sidearm/holster and his '03 Colt .32 boot gun - killed him two hotel bandits with it in '36, in Havana, while working on location, for Captain Blood ... but that's another story!
Here's the good Sergeant taking the late afternoon sun in his tent doorway somewhere along the Rio Grande Patrol, 1914. Photo taken with his personal Kodak Vest Pocket Camera!
... and the good Sergeant - the scrappy little Texan on the left - settling 'a misunderstanding' with one of his men, behind the cook tent - and he reportedly never lost a fight - always with a clean/short fight. Again, photo taken with his Kodak Vest Pocket Camera! ... how cool is THAT!?
Two pocket cameras - one circa 1914 and the other circa 2007 - 93 years between their manufacture dates. Can you tell them apart? (The silver one's the newer one![:D])
Service album, camera and case.
Vest Pocket Camera with bellows open. Notice the 'foot' that can be swung down (front left) to stabilize the camera for a remote photos.
One of a couple of hundred plates of the veterinary operating room at Ft. Riley.
Troopers learning the fine art of shoeing their rides.
[:D][:D][:D]
This is from a letter I sent to a Texas friend who has an interest in the old time cavalry down on the border in the early part of the 1900's. My wife's grandfather was there so I thought he'd get a kick out of this story. I'm interested in cameras, so this was a perfect (family historical) Christmas gift!
The letter read:
Vic,
Here's some photos of that camera that Mary (Gale's mom) dug out of a trunk family trunk - there are many. Seems that it's Sergeant 'Swanny' (Earl) Swan's old Army camera. He carried it along the Mexican border during 1914 - 1915 and then into Mexico after Pancho Villa in 1916/1917 and later though the First World War - 'Over There' in 1917/1919. I'd give my right arm to talk to the guy ... he passed away in 1959 after 39 years working all of the major studios in Hollywood - 1920-1959 - as a Senior Prop Man.
Story goes, he was mustered out of the cavalry in 1919 and didn't want to cowboy in Texas, so he drifted West to Venice Beach, California, where he met two city slickers in a card game. He was relieving them of their gambling money. One of the two 'rubes' was named Samuel Goldwyn. Seems ole Sam was complaining about old cowboys shooting holes in the local movie houses 'flicker screens!' Seems that Sam had a 'picture studio' over (3 miles east) in Culver City and he was making (bad) one reel westerns ... and he didn't know the difference between McClellan saddle and cowboy saddles! He, nor any of his employees, knew what kinds of guns were used in the Indian Wars ... angry drunken troopers and ex-cowboys were standing up in the middle of their (bad) 'flicker shows' and demanding their nickels back ... sometimes punctuating their outrage with flying bullets at the offending images on the screens!
Swanny said, "Sam, you pay me three dollars a day and I'll straighten out your 'kit,' for you!" He hired Swanny and Swanny kept his end of the bargain - and there was more to it than just saddles - there were pictures, and mirrors over the bars, and the specialized shapes of the period card tables and furniture, etc. Apparently, the next 40 years were quite a ride - one that I'd love to know more about. Some of Swanny's best drinkin' buddies numbered the likes of Earl Flynn, Bill (WC) Fields, Laurence Olivie, Tallulah Bankhead, Jean Harlow, both Barrymores, Clark Gable, Gary Cooper, Will Rogers, Chaplin, Keaton and probably a host of others! Mary has a lot of their letters to 'Swanny' Swan.
Anyway, last week I mentioned to my mother-in-law, Mary, that I had bought myself a small pocket camera for convenience sake - I like cameras and would like to have a small one that could fit nicely into my shirt pocket when traveling. I bought a new Nikon S700 - awesome little camera. Mary said that she'd bring Swanny's camera down and give it to me (since I preserve all the familys' history/historical items) - I was delighted!
I had wondered to myself, in passing, last year, while archiving the 260 photos Swanny had taken along the Rio Grande, in the 'Mexican Incursion' and during the Great War what kind of camera he had used. I just couldn't imagine a cavalry sergeant lugging around even a smaller box camera. I didn't know they had any cameras that were smaller than the old Kodak box cameras - they did - it was called the Vest Pocket Kodak.
Today I've been marveling at the simplistic engineering that went into it - first sold in 1912, they were manufactured until 1926 - an amazing 1.8 million were sold!
See URLs below.
1.
http://www.cosmonet.org/camera/vestan_e.htm
2.
http://www.cosmonet.org/camera/verito_e.htm
I put my new Nikon in the picture to compare them. It's amazing how far we came in the last 95 years! ... and it's amazing how well those great great grandfather cameras did riding into battle after battle, year after year with the U.S. Cavalry! The wear on the brown carrying case shows it's spent a lot of time in the calvary, too!
Mary also brought me his Ft. Riley Cavalry Book - 1916 - which has hundreds of fascinating photos of the fort's various functions, men and officers. It's a great snapshot of calvery history!
There are a few more of Swanny's books up in Venice that I want to see and bring back with me next week when we pass through there as we drive up to Santa Barbara.
We've have his M1911 sidearm/holster and his '03 Colt .32 boot gun - killed him two hotel bandits with it in '36, in Havana, while working on location, for Captain Blood ... but that's another story!
Here's the good Sergeant taking the late afternoon sun in his tent doorway somewhere along the Rio Grande Patrol, 1914. Photo taken with his personal Kodak Vest Pocket Camera!
... and the good Sergeant - the scrappy little Texan on the left - settling 'a misunderstanding' with one of his men, behind the cook tent - and he reportedly never lost a fight - always with a clean/short fight. Again, photo taken with his Kodak Vest Pocket Camera! ... how cool is THAT!?
Two pocket cameras - one circa 1914 and the other circa 2007 - 93 years between their manufacture dates. Can you tell them apart? (The silver one's the newer one![:D])
Service album, camera and case.
Vest Pocket Camera with bellows open. Notice the 'foot' that can be swung down (front left) to stabilize the camera for a remote photos.
One of a couple of hundred plates of the veterinary operating room at Ft. Riley.
Troopers learning the fine art of shoeing their rides.
[:D][:D][:D]
0
-
I have one of those cameras myself!
Another most likely a bit newer, but still looks the same other than being covered in a brown "leatherette".0 -
Yep - I saw those as I was researching Swanny's. I think I'm going to see if I can find some film - apparently there are some folks who sell it - and take some photos. The camera looks
like it'd work just fine!
[8D]0 -
My grandmother was still using the brown one from time to time, before she passed away, which was 1978.
It worked fine, and took rather good pics.
She didn't like the "new fangled" cameras!0 -
That little Nikon's a 12.1 (Effective) Megapixels - always nice to know that you can make poster sized prints of your snapshots! [:D] 0 -
Scott,.....off topic, but did you ever see one of those "wire coil" recording machines?
I have one of the things, wish I knew where it came from!
I need to clear out some stuff![;)]0 -
I've seen them - dad had one - they were made by Dictaphone, I believe, among others.
Here's the URL.
http://www.recording-history.org/HTML/wire8.php
Enjoy!
[:D]0 -
I'll have to pull it out when I get the chance, but for some reason the name Webster Chicago strikes a chord in my head, after looking at your link.
I have no antiques around the house in view, but when I start digging through closets, that's another story![:0]0 -
"Webcor"??
Thanks, zip.
More lore for me.
Doug0 -
Yep - you know what they say about us BSers!
I love a good story - this one just dropped from Santa's sleigh!
[:D]0
Please sign in to leave a comment.
Comments
9 comments