Monroe Camera

[andrea costamagna]

Hi, I have this camera belonged to my ancestors, which is missing the plate holder / ground glass holder.
Does someone have any photo or drawing that can help me to build it?
I would like to restore the camera.
Thanks in advance for your attention, regards.

ps.: I apologize for the bad english... :)

[Steven Tribe]

The Monroe Camera Company was founded in 1897 and is best known for folding cameras. After barely three years of operations, Monroe merged with four other companies in 1899 to form the Rochester Optical and Camera Company.

So this is one of the many small makers of "self-casing" american cameras that produced quite excellent leather covered mahogany "box" folding cameras. This one has the split box which allows variation in the photographic plane. As far as I can see, you need to make a ground glass holder, acquire some plate holders and some metal sheaths to hold modern film and you have a working camera. I can't find an image on the net tonight, but I think there will be one. The Unicum shutter may be a problem as the shutter leaves and iris leaves are made of early synthetic blades. Most of these had Rapid Rectilinear lenses.

[Steven Tribe]

This is probably not what you are after - but here is an image of a Monroe camera sold in a UK auction yesterday!

There was only this one image.