My first camera is sitting on top of my refrigerator as I type. A Kodak Brownie Hawk-eye with flash attachment. My dad brought me a Zeiss Ikon Nettax folding 120 camera from Europe in 1958. Started working with a 2 1/4 x 3 1/4 Busch Pressman in 1962, still have it. My first 35 mm camera was a Spotmatic I picked up in Japan in 1965. I purchased a two body, three lens, 3 back Zenza Bronica S-2 outfit on that same trip. Worked well for about a year. Repairs kept it going through college and a couple of studios I either partnered in or worked for in San Francisco through 1972. Started working in 4x5 with a Busch Pressman at that time. Got rid of the Bronica kit and the Spotmatic in trade for a black Spotmatic and a half dozen primes to work as a travel photographer in Europe through 1974. Still have the black Spotmatic and a 50 mm f1.4, but it's a real beater now.
From 1975 ~ 1987 I worked as a spook on the dark side, and did some personal photography, but not a lot. Too tired mostly. During that time I did expand my screw-mount collection to about 15 lenses and picked up another (used) black Spotmatic body. In 1990, that body, 6 lenses including a stove-pipe 600 mm were stolen out of my car at an event. My automobile insurance replaced them with a PZ-1, three Tokina zooms (28 mm~200 mm range) and a Tamron 300 mm f2.8 with Tamron 2x tele-extender. Worked that kit (and still do, but replaced the PZ-1 with a PZ-1p body) until 1997, when I hired on to help catalog and dispose of a venerable photo store in Seattle, whose inventory filled the store, the empty store next door, and 3 rented garages. It took a year of a few days a week, and ultimately a dozen weekends of sales, for which I was supposed to be paid. Never was from the start, so I started setting "stuff" aside in the warehouse we rented. Accumulated a LARGE pile over in the corner. When the sales were over, I asked the boss to go through the pile and let me know what I could keep, unless he wanted to pay me my back wages, over $3000 by then. He looked at the pile, then at me, then asked his partner if I was ripping him off. Nope, sez he. eBay kept me alive and my mortgage paid for the next two years as I sold off what I decided I really didn't need. Some of it I wish I could have kept now, but hey, I probably wouldn't have used it much. Lots of 2 1/4 gear, several Pentax 6x7 kits, including a bellows and slide copier set, many 4x5, 5x7 and 8x10 cameras and darkroom gear. Several old Asahi bodies and lenses, Dozens of antique Kodak folders and studio cameras, many collectibles. Even sold an 8 x 10 Century on a police ID rail setup, with numbers you could set from the camera position. Gobs of Polaroid. Nikon and Canon bodies from the 70s and 80s, with assorted lenses. I kept the Deardorf 8x10 and a bag of holders, a dozen or more lenses and shutters, and assorted accessories. And I still have both Busch Pressmans, in field kits, along with 2 1/4 x 3 1/4 Speed Graphic, 4x5 Speed Graphic, all kinds of flash gear, darkroom gear (Got rid of the Super Chromega 2 years ago) including enlarging lenses for all formats, slide projectors from the Kodak 110 to an antique 2 1/4 x 3 1/4. In case you missed it, my latest purge on eBay included a SMCP-A* 135 f1.8, a SMCP-A* 200 mm f2.5, an 18 mm f2.8, 50 mm f1.2, and a handful of -M and -A lenses - several macros. That was in February. Once I get unpacked at my new digs in Seattle, I'll be putting more out there for sale. Unfortunately, the "good stuff" I have left will probably stay. I'll keep one LX and all it's accessory finders and backs for a while longer, and some of the keeper flash gear. Just in case. I'll be putting photos up on my website in the next few months of the gear I have, and that which I no longer want. This will include 2 LXs and a Program-A (motor drives, winders for both are available) and more I won't bother listing yet. First LX to sell comes with 2 bricks of frozen Ektar 25. The second LX comes with a bunch of frozen Velvia. All film out of date but frozen solid. So it's obvious that I will hang on to my "old" DSLRs for a while, as well as my PZ-1p, my Spotmatic, an LX (the shiniest one), and my K100D, K10D, K20D and a 67 kit. And yes, I use them all, all at the same time, so they won't go to waste sitting on a shelf. ;-p Joseph McAllister -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
