I was looking up something in my copy of Mckeowen's 2001 guide yesterday. I couldn't find what I was looking for but was (somehow for the first time) surprised by the huge number of run of the mill cameras and never remembered brands that fill most of the pages.

What I was trying to research is an item in a current offering on the-Bay for a Kodak 2D. There are many items in thi lot, and they look like they all belong together. It looks like there is a focal planer shutter hanging on the back of the 8x10 rear standard, but no mention of it appears in the description. I had inquired about that, but the seller is B&H and they couldn't be bothered to make a substantive answer.

so I got out my McKeowen's and tried to look it up searching using "Kodak, Eastman View and Folmer &
schwing". Nothing helpful there. But what suddenly struck me was the HUGE number of ho-hum cameras that no one now ever thinks about; brand names and companies that are gone and forever forgotten; unremarkable cameras . . . .and cheap cameras. Not much in the way of large format view cameras or their lenses.

Now I regret having paid to buy the book twenty years ago.