Originally Posted by
IanG
The Vageeswari cameras are based on Houghton (Butcher) cameras so different to the Rajah. Houghton (India) Ltd, later to become Houghton Butcher (Eastern) Ltd made cameras in India before WWII and had Sales offices in Bombay and Calcutta they were also the distributors for Ross lenses in India.
Houghton Butcher (Eastern) Ltd itself was owned by British Photographic Industries. Ltd and a shareholder was Major The Hon.. J. J. Astor who was aide-de-camp to the Viceroy of India 1911-14, he later became an MP and Chairman of the Times (which he'd bought) and was a director of Hambros Bank, Phoenix Assurance and the GWR.
It's probable that Houghton (India) formed in 1911 had taken over part of the John Blees business based in Calcutta, he ran a studio and was also an importer and manufacturer, he was advertising locally made cameras in 1895, he had been a well known wet plate photographer in India as far back as the mid 1870's. In his own words in a 1910 advert “John Blees' Cameras known to stand the Indian Climate.” He was also the distributor of Ross lenses in India prior to Houghton (India) Ltd. By 1920 the John Blees company was owned by J H Gordon M.P.S. (a chemist) and was operating mainly as a studio again.
It's known that Vageeswari Camera Works had a link to a British manufacturer, their name doesn't seem to appear until after WWII by which time Houghton Butcher had been restructured after their head quarters was destroyed in the Blitz in 1940. Ensign emerged and contiued trading into the 1960's, there was still an Indian subsidiary, however large format camera production had ceased. That raises the question of what happened to the Indian workshop(s) that had once made Houghton Butcher LF cameras after WWII.
During the 1930's the Japanese had copied the Indian made LF cameras as a consequence there are cameras like the Asahi field camera, the Asanuma, some sold by Charten, which all look very similar to the Vageeswari's.
Ian
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