Cameras and Camera Supplies, Catalogue 11M Season 1903, Cash Buyer's Union, (Chicago, IL), dated 1903, ~8 ½"x11", 16pp

This large format catalog is printed on newspaper-like thin paper, and it is apparently a small part of a much larger catalog, similar to the photography catalogs that Sears & Roebuck would print that only contained those pages of the full catalog pertaining to photography.  The Cash Buyer's Union photography catalog consists of pages numbered 1 through 13, then continues with 60 through 62 (or 63, if you count the inside back cover) that pertain to phonographs, as if photographers are also into music.  Page 60 is printed on the back of page 13, so the omission of pages 14-59 is deliberate.  Of particular interest to wooden field view cameras is page 4, where an ad for the "Seneca View Camera" contains two very different engravings, one for the Seneca View Camera as identified by the label on the camera, and the other for the Imperial View Camera as identified by its attached label.  The numerous leather-covered cameras identified as "Seneca" do seem to correspond to the numbered models offered by the Seneca Camera Manufacturing Co. of Rochester, NY, so the Cash Buyer's Union mostly resold cameras manufactured by Seneca.  Why the Imperial engraving is shown is a mystery.  An order form is shown after the catalog.












 

 

 

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