Old Photo Magazines

[Doug T.]

Hi All!
I was in an antique shop today, and found a booth with 20-30 old photo magazines from the late 40's to early 50's. Mostly Pop Photo with a couple of U.S. Camera included. Price was 2 and 3 USD each.
I only had enough cash on hand to get a couple (I don't like to use a card if I don't have to), but I bought a few, including Pop Photo annuals from 1948 and 1953.
A little reading material for the weekend.
I'm really fond of old photo literature, even though my wife says that they smell musty. As long as it's not ME that smells musty, I won't be banished to a shelf in the garage

Doug

[daveh]

Doug,

I've got umpteen Amateur Photographer magazines from the late 1960s into the 70s. I also got a batch from someone from the 1950s. They I stored at my son's house. I must get them out and browse.

I was quite happy ignoring them until your post!

Dave.

[Doug T.]

Dave,
I really enjoy old things like that. The full page ads look good framed and hung in the "Man Cave"
Doug

[daveh]

There are some wonderful old cameras, at old prices such as £12 9s 11d - so much nicer than decimal money - that were advertised.

[drako]

Would love to see Modern Photographer & Popular Photographer from the 70's. These are the publications that instilled my early desire for the beautiful, well crafted SLRs of that time. I love those pornographic display ads of the cameras of that time!

[daveh]

I have one or two American magazines of that era, but they used to annoy me - only because the prices in the USA were so much less than the UK.

[herron]

For a while I collected old magazines for their articles on 60s and 70s cameras. Still have a lot of them, but most of them had the articles of interest scanned and digitized, with the musty old paper remaining consigned to the trash (much to the relief of my wife).

Now, I subscribe to Popular Photography and Shutterbug, but toss the oldest when the third year arrives (i.e.; toss 2008 when 2010 issues arrive). I used to subscribe to the UK publication Amateur Photographer, as I found it's articles very incisive ... alas, it cost too much to keep it coming to the Colonies.

[mickeyobe]

I used to buy the American magazines occasionally but never subscribed because I was annoyed at having to flip through page after page and often back and forth in order to read an article. It seemed to me that pleasing the advertisers was more important than producing a logically laid out, reader friendly publication. Shutterbug did get my paid subscription as did a few more specialized magazines.

A Canadian magazine, Photographic Canadiana, was published to which I subscribed as it struggled to survive for years. However it started to publish articles that were irrelevant to most readers and some items by a writer who obviously did not know much about photography. I finally gave up on it after six years.

The excellent British, Amateur Photographer, was my favourite and my newspaper vendor always put a copy aside for me. I still have several copies containing an excellent series on Large Format For Beginners. AP introduced me to Theodore Scheimpflug's theory which I learned then but seem to have forgotten after 13 year of non use. But it being a weekly and being very expensive in Canada ultimately made me to decide to stop buying magazines.

I never attended any photography classes and all my photographic knowledge was gleaned from books and the multitude of magazines I had acquired.

I still have all the books. But about seven years ago I started running out of shelf space for my growing camera collection. It was either musty magazines or musty cameras. I opted for cameras. Twenty one feet of shelving was occupied by my magazines. I made a herculean effort to first sell and then donate them to camera clubs and schools and even private individuals without any success. It pained me but they all went into the recycling bin.

I have retained a number of annual directories and buying guides going back to 1980.

Today I can walk past the shelf of photo magazines in Chapters or Indigo with nary a glance. My i Mac is now my tutor. What would I do without it?

Mickey

[daveh]

As with Mickey, I too have never been to a photographic class and have learnt in much the same way to you - mostly trial and error.

I have (I think) all my old photo magazines, mainly Amateur Photographer. They should be in the loft at my son's house. I must get them out sometime.

I did buy (very cheap) some 1950s APs several years back. As you say in the main no one wants them. I have too much of a camera collection compared to some of you, but I do have an assortment of (umpteen) computers and several (hundred) books.