what’s up doc?

Posted on August 16, 2021 by Robert

c1847 daguerreotype of a famous operation in Boston – first use of anesthetic.

Toronto. .. as that wascally wabbit from Brooklyn said to Elmer Fudd in the movie cartoons of yesteryear. From its very beginning, photography has been a huge asset for medicine and dentistry.

This Southworth and Hawes plate at left shows a Boston operating room c1847/8 (Massachusetts General Hospital). It is a period recreation of the first “etherization” of a patient undergoing surgery on his jaw. This image and information is courtesy of the 1976 book, “The Spirit of Fact“. I bought my hard cover copy September 2, 1976. Only a few thousand were ever printed as far as I know. A Dover reprint is available but the plates are shown smaller and not as clear and accurate as  resolution and colour.

When the minicam craze hit, dentists made use of the 35mm cameras and accessories as shown by this c1935 Leica set up by dentist A L  Dunn of Santa Barbara California and featured in many editions of  the Leica Manual.

Over the years, other machines using the basis of photography came into use as diagnostic devices such as the x-ray machine to determine organ defects (highlighted by a dye injection). And the massive and noisy MRI machines used to analyze soft tissue issues (some without use of dye injections, some with) shown here are neck blood vessels. What’s up indeed!

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pet shop boys

Posted on August 15, 2021 by Robert

Pete and Rusty return from a winter break (Feb 1982)

Toronto. One niche area in photography is pet photography which has grown in popularity. You can also read this article dated May 26, 2015 in The Guardian or this one on historic photos of dogs dated April 2, 2015 in the  Fauna and Flora blog. Pets being like children, they are nearly in constant motion and pay little attention.

Pets  also appeared in advertisements for cameras like the Exakta and Hasselblad as cover shots for brochures and magazines. The two shown here examples of the opposite ends of the pet spectrum. The fox terrier, Pete, was thrown out at a nearby school when he was a pup and followed one of my children home. The Sheltie is a pedigree animal. registered and bought from a kennel. He was sold as he grew taller than acceptable for the breed and was about the size of a border collie,

The photo was taken with a Leica on transparency film  – most likely Kodachrome. The post name is a British musical duet formed in 1981 and active to date.

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fire sale

Posted on August 14, 2021 by Robert

Peoples Stores fire in Midland March 4, 1960

Toronto. Photography introduced the average person to events of the day and to history. Over 60 years ago, I was seconded to our office in Midland, Ontario to lend a hand. Imagine my surprise on that chilly Monday morning, March 7th, 1960 when I walked down King St to reach the central office on Hugel.

The store called “‘Peoples Stores” had been gutted by fire! The previous Friday, March 4th, fire broke out and before the fire brigade could bring it under control, the top two floors plus the street level store interior were consumed! I captured  the loss on film with my Exakta VXIIa on that Monday afternoon. The image at left is just one of the many photographs I took.

The “fire sale” was recored photographically as it was fought by local fire brigades. Photos by the local paper, the “Midland Free Press Herald” plus some captions are now part of the Huronia Museum website.  The Free Press Herald began its decline in the 1960s and finally expired the summer of 2013 after bouncing from pillar to post, losing critical assets to each of its many buyers. Like other newspapers and magazines, it was a victim of the onslaught of much lower cost digital media and superficial coverage of events.

If not for photography, we would never know just how devastating this catastrophe was to the small community once the home to Leitz Canada who made the lenses of Walther Mandler and briefly the later M4 Leica cameras (M4, KE-7A, M4-2, etc) as Leitz struggled with financial issues. The factory still exists, but is now American owned, most recently by Raytheon.

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JCCC exhibition on MARU in America – August PHSC Presentation

Posted on August 13, 2021 by Robert

Toronto. The Japanese diaspora in the Americas is part of a global network of communities known as Nikkei with over 150 years of history. Join us on August 18th, 2021 at 8 pm (we begin around 7:30 with a social get together – all welcome). Read the poster below for more information. This poster was created by our PHSC News editor Sonja Pushchak.

Go to Eventbrite for free tickets or to program@phsc.ca with any questions.

Zoom audience questions are welcome.

Our August 2021 presentation on the MARU communities

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breaking the frame

Posted on August 12, 2021 by Robert

Dorothea Lange, Argument in Trailer Court, circa 1943. © The Dorothea Lange Collection, the Oakland Museum of California, City of Oakland. Gift of Paul S. Taylor.

Toronto. All you image collectors in the GTA, the ROM is opening a new exhibition of photographs starting this Saturday (August 14, 2021) and running to next January 16, 2022.

The exhibition covers the beginnings of our art (c1839) to late 20th century. The announcement on the ROM website says, “Experience the unexpected in the North American debut of Breaking the Frame, featuring one of the earliest photographs taken by a female artist, unusual subject matter from the biggest names in photography, and portraits from photo studios in West Africa and India. Explore more than 90 original and vintage prints from the Solander collection that inspire new and unconventional approaches to photo history.

“Breaking the Frame showcases many accomplished artists of the 19th and 20th centuries – from Malick Sidibé and Florence Henri to Lang Jingshan, Ansel Adams, Diane Arbus, Henry Fox Talbot, Robert Frank, and Dorothea Lange – who have helped shape photography, offering a global perspective on the medium that pushes our understanding beyond the conventional.”

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photography as a record keeper

Posted on August 11, 2021 by Robert

1922 Self Portrait – Arthur Goss

Toronto. In 1869/70, the Brooklyn Bridge construction began and was dutifully recorded by photography. In 1933, construction of the Golden Gate Bridge began as was recored by Peter Stackpole using a Leica camera.

In between these two events, Arthur  Goss became our first official city photographer in 1911. Goss’ talent was artistic so each of his professional photographs were both a record and an artistic item. Goss was also a member of the Toronto Camera Club and he was included in Lilly Koltun‘s epic 1984 book on “Amateur photography in Canada/1839-1940“, called “Private Realms of Light“. The massive hard cover book was published by Fitzhenry & Whiteside in Markham (I bought my copy from their representative June 18th, 1985). Many of the book’s writers were/became speakers at the monthly meetings of the PHSC.

The story of Arthur Goss and a selection of his photographs were published in issue 12-3 of Photographic Canadiana (Nov-Dec 1986) under the guidance of editor Doug Gilbertson.

Self portrait by Arthur Goss – “This image is available from the City of Toronto Archives, listed under the archival citation Fonds 200, Series 372, Sub-series 41, Item 597.This tag does not indicate the copyright status [it is public domain] of the attached work. A normal copyright tag [you are reading the tag] is still required. See Commons:Licensing for more information., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=24271999

By recording in detail the construction of extensive projects, photography entered into a new and historical area (mind you some even earlier outdoor photography recorded existing structures).

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not clarifying matters

Posted on August 10, 2021 by Robert

CLARUS MS-35 camera ad in 1948

Toronto. Post WW2 many American companies dreamt up clever ways to gain traction in the booming retail camera market. The Clarus Camera maker in Minneapolis had an added difficulty to overcome – their products suffered from poor quality, especially the shutters.

When they pushed their MS-35 camera (c1946-c1952), with this ad in the October, 1948 issue of Popular Photography, the camera was promoted as equal to a high end import for a third the cost. Sadly, the savvy amateurs targeted as buyers, did not bite in any significant way. Rushing the MS-35 to market in 1946 to meet the pent up demand had seriously affected quality and backfired on the company.

The camera never did succeed. Camera and maker disappeared in the face of far better quality imports. Collectors today will pay around the original price if the camera is in pristine condition and working flawlessly.

Once again, the generosity of George Dunbar in sharing this research into our favourite historical topic is appreciated by all.

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sometimes we are elegant

Posted on August 9, 2021 by Robert

1947 advertisement announcing the Kdaslide Projector – Master Model

Toronto. Kodak was known for its films and photographic supplies. The company, once the leader in photography, in later years made inexpensive and rather ugly plastic ‘film burners’, readily bought by the general public as gifts or to record family members and events.

The company was far more impressive in its design of high end slide projectors. As slides slowly faded away, most homes who recognized quality had a Carousel projector while many companies used its commercial equivalent. The 80 and later 144 slide circular horizontal slide tray was ubiquitous. One could also buy a device to quickly show a box of slides on a Carousel without using a tray.

On pages 77 and 78 In this July, 1947 Popular Photography advertisement, Kodak introduced its very sheik and elegant ‘Kodaslide Projector, Master Model‘ which had a choice of lenses of at least 5 different focal lengths and bulbs of up to 1,000 watts in power consumption for projection of colour slides up to 20 feet wide! A beautiful design with impressive specifications. At the time all it lacked was a tray and a means to mount it, hence its replacement in time by newer designs in spite of its otherwise very flexible specifications.

Many thanks to fellow photo historian and PHSC member, George Dunbar, for sharing this marvellous find.

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if at first you don’t succeed …

Posted on August 8, 2021 by Robert

August 1948 ad for new Spartus cameras.

Toronto. … try and try again! And that is what Spartus did. A new name?A new town? A new camera style? The company began around 1934 in NYC as the Utility Manufacturing Company. It moved to Chicago in the 1940s and became the Spartus line as part of the Spencer Company. They tried box cameras, built-in flash box cameras, 35mm style cameras, twin lens reflex designs, etc. The cameras continued into the 1960s under yet another company – Herold Manufacturing founded by an officer of the Spencer Company.

The cameras had one thing in common. They were all cheaply made. The various cameras usually had bakelite bodies with thin metal in places and somewhat indifferent lenses. The advertisement from page 8 of the August, 1948 issue of Popular Photography shows a couple of typical camera styles used by the Chicago company/ies.

Their film burners of the day never really overcame the mighty Kodak or the more modest Ansco line in pursuit of a vigorous slice of the retail camera scene. The company owner and his wife did become wealthy over time using many loop holes in the law along the way. Today, even collectors are indifferent to Spartus cameras.

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a nasty piece of work

Posted on August 7, 2021 by Robert

Plutonium core of Fat Man Atomic Bomb

Toronto. Seventy six years ago on August 9th, 1945 the Japanese city of Nagasaki woke to a terrible calamity. Around 11:00am, the second Atomic Bomb called “Fat Man” was dropped by the US Airforce, levelling a wide area of the city. Within days Japan capitulated and in the following month WW2 was officially over, saving a huge number of troops on both sides of the war while laying waste to a city and its civilian population.

The Atomic bombs were so called ‘dirty bombs’. Fission broke heavy elements into lighter elements plus massive amounts of energy and ionizing radiation. The later Hydrogen Bombs by comparison were ‘clean bombs’ created by fusion where light elements were merged to make slightly heavier elements plus even more massive amounts of energy. Check out wikipedia on Nuclear Weapons for more details.

The event was recorded in 1945 and is shown here on the “Rare Historical Photos” website. I read the book “Brighter Than a Thousand Suns” about the Manhattan Project and the Atomic bomb back in the late 1950s/early 1960s.

The site shows a colour photograph of Harold Agnew (right) and a fellow soldier who is unidentified. Agnew kept this photo. The silver scratchings? They were done by the FBI to ‘declassify’ the photograph.

A big thank you to friend and fellow PHSC member George Dunbar for sharing this photographic record and commentary on the final days of WW2.

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