Please Note:
Even though this article was published years ago, its basic message is as true today as it was then, and I thought it to be interesting reading even today.
LEICA LUNATICS
By Daniel Grotta-Kurska
Reprinted by permission from
Philadelphia Magazine
February 1974
The 1913 Ur-Leica, the prototype that started it all
“You keep telling yourself that it’s only
metal, glass and fabric, that the damn thing’s nothing more than a machine; a
collection of gears, springs and ball bearings.
Your mind says that it’s only a camera, just like an Instamatic or
Polaroid or a Brownie. But then you take
it into your hands, heft it up and down a few times to feel the balance, try
out its flawless focusing, fire off a couple shots to hear its ultra-quiet
shutter and it becomes an unmistakable instrument of perfection, a thing of
beauty. Then you know for a certainty
that in this entire world there’s only one thing like a Leica, and that’s
another Leica.”
-PHILADELPHIA LEICA COLLECTOR
A Leica is a Leica is a
Leica, just like a Rolls-Royce is a Rolls-Royce and a Rolex is a Rolex and a
Bang and Olufsen is a Bang and Olufsen.
The Leica is, without a doubt, the very finest 35mm camera in the
world. Leica is the ultimate of
ultimates, the most coveted, sought after, and proudly possessed piece of
photographic equipment anywhere. Whether
they admit it or not, inside every Minolta or Pentax or Nikon owner there’s a
Leicaphile trying to get out.
Unfortunately the Leica system, being the best, also happens to be the
most expensive. This means that it is
priced out of the reach of most serious and professional photographers, who
have to make do with their Nikons and spin all sorts of rationalizations and
justifications to explain to themselves and others why they didn’t really want
a Leica in the first place. This makes
for a rather odd situation; whenever photographers get together, they usually talk
about photography, but whenever Leica owners assemble, they inevitably talk
about……Leicas.
Leica owners belong to a select fraternity who
share their status, style and elegance with each other and it doesn’t matter a
twit whether they have the latest model or a 45-year-old Model A. A Leica is a Leica is a Leica. Well, not quite. There are super select Leica purists who, for
example refuse to acknowledge the existence of the CL model because it was
assembled in – horrors! – Japan. Still
other Leicaphiles refuse to use the reflex models because they believe Leica
should only make rangefinders, the M series cameras.
Owning a Leica can be an
infectious, incurable disease. Since
Leica owners are already at the top, the only upward mobility left to them is
to own more Leicas. Occasionally you’ll
meet an elderly doctor or a distinguished lawyer who is perfectly content with
his one camera and lens, but they are very much the exception. Once you have the basic camera, the next step
is to possess the entire current camera system.
At current (1974) market prices, a system can easily cost $10,000 and
up.
After the current system, the
really hard-core Leicaphiles inevitably start collecting systems. Over the years, Ernst Leitz, the firm that
makes Leicas, has produced so many different models, lenses and accessories that
even it isn’t sure where it all ends.
But according to its records, in the 50 years that it has been marketing
35mm cameras, it has produced a grand total of 1.3 million Leicas (1974), or an
average of 27,000 cameras per year. That
means that, in addition to being very expensive, used Leicas also happen to be
relatively rare these days.
Leica 1 or Model A, the first Leica to be marketed in 1925
Leica owners might seem to be
a trifle eccentric, but Leica collectors come across as out-and-out high class
cranks. They’re an ultra-secretive,
paranoid lot who are afraid of fire, theft, and Acts of God. One center city lawyer prizes his Leica
collection so much that he keeps it all in two bank vaults, in two different
buildings. Another Main Line collector
declines to reveal where his collection is squirreled away, but admits that he
wouldn’t dare keep it in anything as unsafe and uncertain as his……home.
This type of behavior isn’t
at all unusual; most Leica collections, in fact, rarely see the light of
day. Since the only person who could
possibly appreciate the mystique and beauty of a bunch of cameras is another
collector. Leica collections are almost
never displayed at home or publicly exhibited.
In a way, the Leica collector is like the millionaire art enthusiast who
recruits brigands to loot the world’s finest museums of their masterpieces and
then build a secret room in his mansion just to privately gloat over the
paintings from time to time.
The very rare Leica 72 half frame model
Every collector whom I
encountered while writing this article made me promise that I wouldn’t reveal
his name, address, or anything else that could remotely identify him. Two of them were so uptight that they
actually had me sign legally binding documents prepared by their respective
attorneys swearing me to anonymity. And
still another collector refused to give me his name and would only speak over
the telephone. Incidentally there are
ten serious and 250 occasional collectors in Philadelphia, but within a few
days time, most of them knew that I was writing an article for the Philadelphia
Magazine. They have a very efficient
grapevine.
No Leica collector starts
with the idea of becoming a collector; it just sort of happens that way. “You get hold of your first Leica and start
using the thing and then you want accessories.
Then you happen to see an old Leica somewhere and buy it because it looks
so good. Somehow you never seem to get
rid of equipment and it just keeps accumulating. Then one day, you take out everything, look
at it and ask yourself, “Good grief! Where did it all come from?” From that day you are a Leica collector.”
Leica Reporter holding film for 250 exposures,
shown here with electric motor drive
Through the years, Ernst
Leitz has produced (manufactured is a misnomer, since almost everything is
virtually handmade) an incredible variety of lenses and accessories for its
many camera models. Some collectors want
to own at least one of everything Leitz has ever made, while others concentrate
and specialize. The center city lawyer,
for example, has a relatively small collection (30 camera bodies and
approximately 60 lenses), but has four ultra-rare Model B cameras. A teenage collector with little money to spend
concentrates his efforts in finding small accessories, such as optional
finders, lens hoods and filters. Other
collectors pass up the cameras in favor of lenses or instruction booklets, or
Leica technical manuals, or old advertisements.
And if that isn’t enough, still other collectors haunt camera stores to
track down the original red boxes which once held Leica cameras and
accessories. Nothing Leitz ever produced
or printed is without value.
Some Leica items have stories
to go with them. Many Leitz lenses, for
example were designed by Professor Dr. Max Berek. Like a comet discoverer, he who designs new
lens formulas gets to name them. Berek
decided to immortalize his two favorite dogs, Hector and Rex, with the Hector
and Summarex series lenses. Incidentally,
one of Berek’s classics is a lens that was designed back in 1926 and was so
outstanding that it is still produced by Leitz.
Leica Luxus
A recent classic is the M4
camera which was only produced between 1967 and 1971. It is perhaps the most rugged and reliable
piece of machinery ever built on God’s green earth. One (true) story is that the Leitz people
once put the M4 through an endurance test to see how long the shutter would
continue to work before breaking down.
To do this, they rigged the camera to a machine that did nothing but
mechanically cock and shoot the shutter, once a second, day and night. The machine broke down long before the M4
did. Another true tale concerns the M4
that was accidentally dropped 2,000 feet from an airplane. The photographer eventually retrieved it,
dusted it off and continued to use it as if nothing had happened.
Leica Gun
More important than classics
to collectors are the rarities, or those models which had very limited
production runs. One such camera was the
Luxus Leica, a blatantly ultra-luxurious model for people rich enough and silly
enough to buy it. The Luxus was
available in red, green blue or brown leather.
Even snakeskin. And believe it or
not, even gold plated. Less than 100
were made in 1929 and it rates as one of the rarest Leicas. Another model is the Leica 72, a half frame
prototype. Then there is the Leica Gun
telephoto camera, of which only a few were made. Other desirable models include the
250-exposure Leica FF, a special gray model IIIc used by the Luftwaffe, a 90mm
screw mount Summicron lens manufactured in Germany (all other Summicrons,
heaven forbid, are made in Canada), and a IIIc with a self-timer. Every collector is also aware of persistent,
unsubstantiated rumors that Leitz secretly produced cameras in South America
during World War II, but so far, nothing has turned up to confirm that.
Four extremely rare Leicas.
Leica Reporter
Leica B, rimset, Leica B, dial set
Leica Model A
Leica collectors are the
first to cheerfully admit that they are probably crazy. “Being unmarried is almost a prerequisite for
serious collecting,” says one bachelor collector who has spent over $35,000 in
the past 20 years on Leicas. “I don’t
know of any wife in her right mind who would put up with this kind of
insanity. A Leica collector needs two
essential things: an understanding family and a big bank account.”
Their insanity is manifested
in many different ways. One collector
with 30 cameras, for example, shoots less than 20 rolls of film each year. Another visits the bank vault three or four
times a year, unwraps his collection, fires each shutter off a few times and
then wraps them back up in Wonder Bread plastic bags.
There is a strong competitive
streak among Leica collectors that has to be seen to be believed. It is perhaps the ultimate in
one-upmanship. One might have a rim-set
Model B, but the other would gloat over his slightly rarer dial-set Model
B. Or one might have three Model A
cameras, but the other might have one with a lower serial number. And then there is the variation of “I paid
$2,000 for mine,” only to be topped by another who proudly announces “I got it
for only $35.”
Leica M4
Leica collectors constantly haunt
camera shops, watch newspaper ads, attend estate auctions and ask their friends
if the know anybody that might have Leica hardware. The serious collectors eventually join the
American Leica Historical Society which is only one of many Leica clubs around
the world. The society exists primarily
for collectors who want to buy or trade equipment. They have even managed to coin a word for
their mania – Leicacunabula.
Incidentally, most of the ads in the LHSA publication Leicalog have box
numbers instead of names and addresses.
A two day Leica factory
technical seminar at the Bellevue Stratford in Philadelphia drew about 150
people, but as usually happens at these affairs; practically all those present
were less interested in the technical lectures than comparing their
Leicas. The overwhelming majority of
students were successful, conservatively dressed, middle aged men, although
there were a few wives and one or two teenagers. It seemed that most of the men suffered
through lectures and slide shows, waiting for the coffee breaks in order to
really come alive. I learned some very
interesting things through those breaks.
-The largest private Leica
collection in the world is, ironically enough, owned by a Japanese rubber
tycoon named Kenijiro Nakamura. But the
third largest collection is right here in America, in Miami, owned by – sorry,
no names please.
-The 2 M4 bodies I had to
sell for $150 each in 1971 in order to pay the rent now go for $600 each.
-Leica equipment has no
depreciation. Virtually every model and
lens made is worth as much or more than it cost originally.
-Old Leicas make damn fine
investments. For example, in 1963 a 105mm
Alpine lens could be had for $35, but you can’t touch one today for less than
$600. Five years ago a Leica IIIc with
lens cost $49, but now the body alone goes for $125. And a model B which originally sold for less
than $100 was bought by a Montgomery County collector for $2,900 in December
and one went for a reported $4,000 in Japan a week earlier.
-Some insurance companies,
such as Liberty Mutual, now offer low cost fine art insurance for old Leicas,
just as if they were oil paintings by old masters.
-In the past three years, old
Leicas have appreciated in value by an average of 300%.
-Leica has, through the
years, spawned a lot of imitators such as Canon, Nicca, Tower, Zorki, Ixa,
Yashica and others. Some of them have
been identical carbon copies.
Enterprising but dishonest mechanics now have a brisk trade modifying
them and selling the counterfeit Leicas as ostensible rare models.
“The market took off like a
rocket about three years ago,” says one serious collector. “Why, I’m not certain, but it could be
nostalgia for all things old, or that indefinable mystique about Leica’s
legendary quality.”
“My wife hates cameras,” says
one local dentist, “but she likes Leicas as investments. She thinks they are a hell of a lot better
than the stock market.”
But why do people collect
Leicas and why are they now considered to be valuable works of art? “They have the feeling of perfection,”
surmises the lawyer. “In an age where
everything is breaking down, it is reassuring to take a 50 year old camera and
have everything work as perfectly as the day it was built.”
If Leica collectors are
crazy, then maybe they are crazy like foxes.
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