Oct, 1955 ad for a HIT-like camera marketed by a Chicago firm
Toronto. Post WW2, any miniature camera was usually called a ‘spy’ camera. Many American marketing companies brought in finished cameras from Occupied Japan and flogged them State-side. Usually the cameras were claimed to be ‘precision’ or ‘precision-made’ although most were just gussied up miniature box cameras.
The cheap price often included rolls of ‘miniature film’, a camera case, and a developing service – or a list of where to take the tiny exposed rolls of film.
For the camera collectors, many of the unnamed cameras are simply grouped as ‘HIT-like’ referencing a tiny Japanese import from the likely maker.
This October, 1955 ad in Popular Mechanics is for one such ‘gold-plated’ model sold directly by the importer, Modern Merchandise Co., in Chicago (you could buy three and pay even slightly less per camera)!
Thanks once again to George Dunbar for spotting this advertisement and sharing it with us.
NB. The post title is a riff on a “dirty ’30s” song from 1932, “Brother, Can You Spare a Dime” sung here by der Bingle (Bing Crosby). My own copy is by Joan Collins.
