Perry Mason & Co., Boston
Harvard Camera, 1888-1895
| The Harvard is a simple, tin box camera with gold pin-striping marketed
to children in the Youth's Companion magazine around the late-1880s and
early-1890s. It took 2½ x 4 inch horizontal exposures on glass plates.
The plates were loaded individually by sliding the vertical metal piece
on the right side of the camera up and sliding the plate in. (This, of
course, had to be done in a darkroom.)
The Harvard Camera was often advertised in 'outfit' form - that is, with tripod, dry plates, chemistry, darkroom trays, and printing frame - all the tools one needed to expose, develop, and print out the plates into photographs. The cost was relatively small, and often could be circumvented by selling subscriptions to the Youth's Companion magazine, or by providing a list of names of those who might be interested in subscribing. It should come as no surprise that the Perry Mason Company not only manufactured the Harvard Camera, but also published the Youth's Companion; hence, the relationship between the two items. |
|
Back to Cameras home | Back to Cameras: 1880-1899 | Back to BoxCameras.com home
