Regardless, I enjoyed walking the floor and doing my usual bottom-feeding. Since I have most things I actually need, I mostly am on the lookout for attractive oddities and bargains, a tendency I inherited from my father, who is a master of such. Last year I came home with a giant bag of expired film, which the dealer clearly thought I was an idiot for buying -- but was only too pleased to send it home with me. Doesn't bother me; I've enjoyed cranking through it to test cameras, etc.
I thought of you guys, especially Phil, given the sheer mass of Retina and Contaflex-class cameras I saw on sale for not much money. One table had close to a dozen Contaflexes laid out marked at $25 per. I strongly suspect they could be had for considerably less, especially if you went today when the show is closing down. But I picked one up and was reminded that I need to return to the gym more regularly. Besides, I have a couple cameras in that class now that need work and use, so can't really justify it.
In the end, I came home with three things that I found useful, or cheap, or both. A pair of stainless film tanks, sized to hold hangers for 8x10 or 4 ganged 4x5's. I already had the hangers, and wanted them for washing dry plates after development, so was glad to find them. Also picked up a set of beat-up 4x5 plate holders for $5. Need some work, but easier than making them from scratch. Lastly was a table dealing mostly in old photos and what appeared to be a range of colored Bakelite box cameras. In poking around in one moving box full of glass plates, some loose, some in other containers, I found a dilapidated 5x7 box containing about 12 or so of them. The first couple seemed interesting, so on a whim, I bought the smaller box and took it home.
I scanned the results and found that roughly half of the plates where somebody's family plates, probably from one of the small cities along the south shore of Lake Erie is my best guess. I really like them, and am pleased to have saved them from whatever fate they would eventually have met in that beat-up old box. The other half appear to be sloppy attempts at copy negatives from not-particularly-well-mounted prints of Great War scenes, probably American troops in France. Those images are tough to make out and weren't perhaps the best technically to begin with. I may work on the latter shots a bit and post them at some point.
But here are the family images, which I quite enjoy. I hope you enjoy them, too.
A day at the beach:
FF-008, At the beach, early 20th century by rbrazile, on Flickr
With pride:
FF-009 by rbrazile, on Flickr
Dressed for church:
FF-010 by rbrazile, on Flickr
Stop by daddy's work on Sunday after church?
FF-019 by rbrazile, on Flickr
An album cover from the 70s, I think;
FF-018 by rbrazile, on Flickr
Robert
