Tailboard Camera & Changing Box

George Hare

Name:	Tailboard Camera & Changing Box
Manufacturer:	George Hare
Country of Origin:	United Kingdom
Construction:	Tailboard camera in mahogany and brass, with additional brass binding. The camera is of a design with a folding side-wing.
Production Period:

 

Plate / Film Size:	½ plate
Lens:	Taylor, Taylor & Hobson 8 x 5 R. R.
Shutter:	Thornton Pickard T & I
Movements:
Dimensions (w x h x l):
Date of this Example:	c1890?
Serial Number:	Serial number 7987 stamped into underside of camera. Taylor, Taylor & Hobson 8 x 5 R. R. No 628
Availability:	Common  Uncommon  Hard to Find  Scarce
Inventory Number:	458

<Photographs to be added>

Description

Mahogany & brass 1/2 plate tailboard camera in good condition.  It may be an Improved Portable Bellows Camera, a form that was apparently made for many years by George Hare.

The camera has prominent brass binding and is of a design with a folding side wing, which is not described in Channing & Dunn [2]. The camera has square section bellows which seem to be in a dark green / black colour, which are in very good condition. The camera as a whole shows some use with odd marks and chips and obvious wear around the tripod mounting, but is in lovely overall condition. The camera carries a plate naming G Hare as the manufacturer on the top face.

The camera came with 2 lenses: one a Taylor, Taylor & Hobson 8 x 5 R. R. EQ. FOC 9.4 IN , and the second an f8 lens of small proportions that is perhaps a wide angle or portrait lens? Both are complete with original leather caps and are in very good order.

The Thornton Pickard shutter has lost its name plate, but has their mark on the ring inside the mounting hole. The proportions are different to others I have - this may be an early variant, perhaps?

The camera also came with a Patent Changing Box, for 24 plates. According to Coe and Channing & Dunn, the normal version was for 12 plates, with larger capacity versions made to order. The changing box is also in very good condition and has its original key, although this is fiddly to operate. It came with the correct dark slide to use with the changing box. The entire set is in good condition.

Three other DDS were also supplied, but may not match the camera.

The seller gave me the following information about its history …

"With regards to the G. Hare camera & changing box I inherited this from my aunt along with the other cameras which are being auctioned. Her husband was a very keen photographer and collector of photographic equipment of all sorts. He died in 1981 and since his death the cameras were kept locked away in a large bedroom which he had converted into his own private museum. According to some records that I have found he acquired the Hare camera in 1960 although it is not stated from whom or who it was previously owned by."

Notes

<None>