What was the first picture you ever took ? And what camera did you take it with ? If you’re like me the chances are it was a Box Brownie. And in my case, the first picture was this : the front of Wells Cathedral, taken on holiday in 1966.
Before you point out the technical faults, I was nine years old, and it was the first time I had been allowed to have a go at photography myself. One of these days I’ll get good at it.
The camera had been my mother’s and I suspect it had been a wedding present, as the first photos I have from it are of my parents' honeymoon. It was a Brownie 620, with a striped front, made between 1953 and 1957 - very like this one that I have with me as I write this. In fact it was slightly more advanced than this as it had a “close up” lens which could be slid in to allow closer focussing.
The photos were usually contact printed to a size of 2¼ by 3¼ inches, but could be enlarged for a modest fee. The quality of the results left something to be desired but when the prints came back, I was very happy with my efforts.
The “Box Brownie” must have been a first camera for countless millions of photographers, and it literally invented the snapshot. There are full histories written elsewhere, but the basics are these. The first version was launched by the Eastman Kodak company in 1900 as a camera for everyman and was priced at $1. It produced 2¼ inch square photos and became an overnight success, and it was also responsible for popularising roll film, also pioneered by Kodak.
The series was long running and there were dozens of versions produced in the USA, Canada, England, Australia and Germany, with the last production being around 1962. The Brownie name was also applied to some other Kodak products, including 8mm movie cameras and finally plastic 127-format cameras.
Brownies were never technically advanced, typically having an f/11 100mm meniscus (1-element) lens, single shutter speed (about 1/50 sec), often a single aperture and no focussing. The shutter could be fired multiple times without winding on the film, which spoiled many a shot. The wind-on was by the “red window” method. The exposure depended pretty much on the old “Sunny f/16” rule, and typical film speed was about 100 ASA. If the sun was shining it overexposed by about 1 stop, and if wasn’t shining it was pot luck. You depended on the latitude of the monochrome film, and a surprising percentage of the shots came out OK.
The Six-20 Brownie used 620 size film which is no longer available, though it is possible to re-spool 120 size film onto the reels.
Some models had a sliding aperture selection (a tab with a choice of 3 holes in it) and there were also “portrait” versions that had a close-up lens. Viewfinders also evolved and improved over the years, but stuck to the format of separate viewfinders for portrait and landscape, from the No2 model of 1901 onwards.
But many of you will remember all this because of course you had one too !
I also have a No.2 Brownie of 1929-1931, in grey, with key winder, slide shutter trigger and an aperture slide giving stops of roughly f/16, f/22 and f/32. This camera takes 120 size film which is still available. I also have the original canvas case for this one, in perfect condition. I plan to run a film through this one and I’ll post the results here.
Remarkably, the mechanics of the Brownies are so simple that they still work even today, and can still produce photographs. In fact some people are still using them precisely because they don’t distract from the picture making process. Perhaps most famously, Bert Hardy took an iconic photograph of two girls at the seaside, in order to show that great photographs can be taken with even the most modest equipment.
Finally, it’s interesting that 120 size roll film was at one time referred to as “Brownie film”, especially in the USA and Japan. When the Japanese camera maker Zenza was looking for a brand name for their medium format cameras, they came up with the name “Bronica” as a contraction of “Brownie Camera”.
If you are interested, there is a great resource on Brownies at https://www.brownie.camera including the pictures of the cameras, the history, instruction manuals and much useful information.
Rick Crowther, May 2019