Not to muddy the waters more, but are you thinking of the swimming pool in Dawson City? Because that was movie film from the teens and twenties. I think...
Let's see now... World's (second) largest camera was found in the muddy waters of a thawed skating rink/swimming pool along with all of it's movie film? Have I got that right?
I own the big 22 inch cirkut camera that Floyd Shellor had made in Tonopah, or at least I own what's left of it.
The camera is missing the lens, bellows, and turntable, but I do have the tripod, basic camera body, and the film magazine with one empty spool of film. It's a long story as to how I found it. Basically the stars were in perfect alignment when I found myself in a very wet and falling down warehouse in Skagway Alaska. You would not believe the amount of old rotting junk in the place and most of it was wet from the leaking roof. The camera only looks like a beat up suitcase and it was underneath a huge pile of stuff that included a broken toilet bowl. I was able to INSTANTLY identify it as a cirkut camera because I own a #16 camera and more than several #10 cameras as well as at least one of all the other sizes. That's the odd part of the story. How was it possible that I could end up in a town I don't live in, find my way into an old warehouse and spot the rarest panoramic camera in the world that should have been in Arizona, not Alaska?
Shellor was in Alaska but never used the big camera here or at least nothing has ever shown up as far as actual photos.
I'm about to leave on a long trip driving a 1929 model A Ford to Valdez Alaska and back to Juneau (1,600 miles). When I get back I'll try to post pictures of Shellor's monster camera.
In the meantime I've posted a picture of his business card that pretty much say's it all, and a photo of Floyd later in life with another big camera that he made. That one doesn't appear to be panoramic but does look like it is setting on a #16 cirkut turntable.
More later if I make it back to town, we had fresh snow on the mountains yesterday (July 27) it could be a long drive in my old touring car that is packed with a lot of LF camera gear. I'm driving alone so if I break down my plan is to drag everything into the brush and bury it, then hitchhike to the next town. That should make a great discovery in the future for someone else if I don't make it back. Oh, I will be sure to make a really ambiguous map to confuse everyone even more.
I am amazed the tripod actually looks quite ordinary. The weight of this monster must be enormous. I have seen pictures of huge camera's on the back of a truck...
Last year, in the Antwerp museum of photography, there was a camera on display with a bellows of about 3 to 4 meters and a groundglass of probably 1 x 1.25 meter... the extendible bed the camera parts were fixed on almost looked like a car chassis...
Ron, I lived in Juneau for 4 yr. What a beautiful place. God I miss it at times. But good luck driving in there since there are no roads into Juneau. So I assume you mean you'll be using the Alaskan Marine Highway ( ferry). A great way to travel and very affordable, at least it was back in the early 90's. While in Juneau stop into The Red Dog Saloon, order the halibut, its fantastic. Robert
Sponsored Ad. (Subscribers to APUG
have the option to remove this ad.)
Jim
Was this that camera found under the skating rink along with a lot of films -- the ice rink was thawed and the items found.....It was an oversized Cirkuit.
Who knows what treasures we will find under the North Pole when it melts... All those cameras that Santa kept in cold storage because some of you were naughty when you should have been nice...
Linear Mode
