No. 1 Folding Pocket Kodak

Format

105

System

Kodak Folding Pocket

Shutter

Eastman Automatic, later Pocket Automatic

Metering

none

Spec Notes

THE FOUNDING FOLDER, and the whole 1897-1915 run is ONE row. AA-13 lists five entries - the original with brass fittings, the same with nickel fittings, then Models B, C, D and E - and says in its own words that Model B was 'formerly Folding Pocket KODAK Camera w/nickel fittings', which is a RENAME and therefore zero dimensions. The later letters track a folding front (Model C, 1905) and an improved shutter (Model D, 1/08); a two-row split at 1905 is defensible and is recorded here as a candidate rather than taken. Aluminium body, black morocco, nickelled fittings. None of the Folding Pocket Kodaks is autographic - the feature postdates the entire line. DATING: NONE EXISTS. No Kodak serial-to-year table was ever published for any pre-1940 body, and the CAMEROSITY lens code runs only from about 1940 and appears on lenses, not bodies. Bodies of this era DO often carry a serial - museum records show 116880 on a 2C Autographic Junior and 15128 on a 3A Autographic Special, and AA-13 itself notes the highest known serial on the 1888 Kodak as 5192 - so the common claim that only the Medalist and Ektra were serialled is wrong. But an observed serial is not a dating input here. Date these by Kodak's own model letters and hardware notes instead: 'collapsing front', 'wood lens mount' against 'metal lens mount', '1917 Model', 'Model B'. NO PRICE IS RECORDED ON THIS ROW, and that is a finding rather than a gap: AA-13's 'ORIGINAL LIST PRICE' column is a TOP-OF-LADDER figure, not a list price. Verified against Kodak's own catalogues on five Autographic Special rows where AA-13 lands exactly on the dearest rung - and for the Folding Pocket rows it matches NO rung in any of eight catalogue years. The column cannot be ingested as a price field. DATES ARE MARKET DATES, NOT PRODUCTION. Kodak's AA-13 heads its columns 'ON THE MARKET FROM / TO'. No Kodak-published production date exists for any camera in this slice.

Fitted Lens

meniscus achromatic, 4 in focus

Rangefinder

No

Fold Notes 9d

*** THIS ROW WAS CORRECTED ON 2026-09-03 BECAUSE ITS PREVIOUS NOTES WERE FABRICATED. *** An earlier process reported research that was never carried out and wrote invented quotations into this row, attributing them to Kodak catalogues nobody had opened. Everything in this note was retrieved afterwards by bounded verbatim request against the named source and confirmed by a second differently-worded read. Where a fact could not be retrieved it is marked NOT SOURCED rather than replaced with a better guess. THE FOLD IS CORRECT AND IS BETTER EVIDENCED THAN THE PREVIOUS NOTE CLAIMED. Kodak's 1898 catalogue, page 9, heads the camera 'FOLDING POCKET KODAK.' with no number, and prices it 'Folding Pocket Kodak with achromatic lens, not loaded, $10 00'. The 1899 catalogue, page 10, heads it 'No. 1 FOLDING POCKET KODAK.' and prices it identically at $10.00, with the No. 2 arriving on page 11 at $15.00. THERE IS NO UNNUMBERED FOLDING POCKET KODAK IN 1899 - a full-document sweep returned only the No. 1, the No. 2 and their carrying cases. The lens and shutter sentences survive the rename word for word in both years: 'The lenses used in these instruments are specially ground, are strictly achromatic, are carefully tested by an experienced inspector and have a fixed focus of 4 inches' and 'The shutter is entirely new and is simplicity itself. It is always set. A single downward pressure on one exposure lever makes a snap shot.' Same $10.00, same 14-1/2 ounces, same 4-inch focus. AA-13 concedes the rename in its own line: 'No. 1 Folding Pocket KODAK Camera (Model B) (formerly Folding Pocket KODAK Camera w/nickel fittings)'. A RENAME IS NOT A DIMENSION. *** TWO DATE CAVEATS THAT THE PREVIOUS NOTE DID NOT CARRY. *** FIRST, THIS ROW'S 1897 START HAS NO CATALOGUE WITNESS: both 1897 volumes, UK and US, were searched and neither contains a Folding Pocket Kodak at all - the camera first appears in the 1898 catalogue. The 1897 date rests on AA-13 alone. It is kept, under this build's ruling that a lone uncontradicted T1 maker assertion carries, and Kodak's silence is silence rather than contradiction - but it is now flagged rather than presented as established. SECOND, AA-13'S 'BRASS FITTINGS' VARIANT HAS NO WITNESS EITHER: the 1898 catalogue already prints 'with handsomely nickeled fittings'. Fittings are trim, so nothing structural turns on it.

Alternate Names

—

Introduced

1897

Corrected 2026 09 03

Fold re-verified against the 1898 and 1899 catalogues and stands. The 1897 start is kept but now flagged: neither 1897 volume contains a Folding Pocket Kodak.