Who'd have thought it?

G

Goldfynche

Senior Member
Back in the early 1970's I was a camera shop salesman in the centre of London, just off Trafalgar Square. Times were simple then. All paperwork and ledgers. No computers of any kind. In the office with all the piles of invoices an receipts, we had this beaten up old camera that we knew would never sell. So we just used it as a paper weight.

About 18 months ago I saw an article on line somewhere. An identical camera (who knows, maybe even the same one) sold at Sotherbys auction house for £1.5 million pounds! I could probably have bought ours for about £15.00 at the time!
 

I wish I had my dad's old Brownie box camera. It was in excellent condition, I don't know what it's worth ...

Your first sentence sounds like the opening sentence of the first chapter of what could turn out to be a bestselling London novel. Seriously.

"Back in the early 1970's I was a camera shop salesman in the centre of London, just off Trafalgar Square. ... Huddled in the shadow of the Institute of Contemporary Arts, there was nothing contemporary about Goldfynche's Cameras ..."

I can just see long-haired customers in bell bottoms short-haired one in pinstripes coming in to buy Nikons and Konicas and Zeiss cameras and lenses. :) And every photographer from every major London newspaper -- it was their hangout, and people came as much to hear the news of the day as to buy films ...


 
When I was dating my present wife in the 60's she had saved her baseball bubble gum cards of the entire Yankees lineup, including Mickle Mantle, Roger Maris, Yogi Berra, etc. One day when she was home from college she asked her mother where her cards went. Her mother, not a baseball fan, nonchalantly told her that she had thrown them in the trash while cleaning her room. I cringe every time I think of that.
 

Yes. In this particular shop we had many well known customers including politicians and the aristocracy.

i remember one amusing time when the wife of J D Sainsbury, who was a regular customer, came into the shop saying that her husband would soon be going on safari and she would like to buy a telephoto lens for his birthday. The purchase duely sorted she left. Not two hours later. J D Sainsbury himself came into the shop. He told us he was shortly going on safari and needed a new telephoto lens. It was extremely difficult to diplomatically put him off purchasing a lens. I can't actually recall exactly how we resolved the situation.
 
I've been thinking of getting rid of all my LPs. Now they are supposedly worth a lot, so I keep them. We never know when something might be valuable. But who wants to bother selling the stuff?
 
Actually even earlier than my first post. Back in the mid 1960's I worked in another camera shop not far from the previous one and I used to go to a pub next door for lunch quite regularly. One day, a new barmaid turned up to work there temporarily. Apparently she was an up and coming actress 'in between jobs'. She was a friendly girl and I used to enjoy chatting to her.

Years later I was amazed to find a picture of her actually working in that pub. UK members will no doubt recognize her.

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