Discontinued
Kfilm camera
Vest Pocket Kodak Special
Format
127
System
Kodak Vest Pocket
Is Film
Yes
Shutter
Kodak Ball Bearing
Metering
none
Research
Kodak AA-13 'History of KODAK Cameras' (model-name strings, market dates, film sizes); Kodak US product catalogues 1900, 1907-1918, 1920-1923, 1926-1931, 1934-35 (Pacific Rim Camera rl/00121 through rl/00156); Kodak instruction books (cameramanuals.org); Science Museum Group / Kodak Museum object records; redbellows.co.uk private census citing Brian Coe; historiccamera.
Produced 1912–1914 · medium confidencehttps://www.pacificrimcamera.com/rl/00134/00134.pdfMARKET DATES, not production - Kodak's AA-13 is headed 'ON THE MARKET FROM / TO'. No price is recorded: AA-13's price column is a top-of-ladder figure, not a list price. See gear_items.kodak-vest-pocket-kodak-special spec_notes.
Category: Film Camera
Format
127
System
Kodak Vest Pocket
Shutter
Kodak Ball Bearing
Metering
none
Spec Notes
*** AA-13 MERGES TWO DIFFERENT CAMERAS INTO ONE ROW, AND THE ADVERSARIAL PASS CAUGHT IT. *** AA-13 prints 'Vest Pocket KODAK Special Camera 1912 1935' - a 23-year run for a model Kodak superseded in 1915 with the Vest Pocket Autographic Kodak Special. Reading Kodak's own catalogues year by year settles it: the 1913 catalogue sells a NON-AUTOGRAPHIC VPK Special with a Zeiss Kodak Anastigmat; the name then DISAPPEARS from 1915 to 1926 while the Autographic Special holds the slot; and in 1928 a 'Vest Pocket Kodak Special' reappears, autographic, with a Kodak Anastigmat f/5.6 or f/4.5. AA-13 has no row at all for the 1926-35 camera. This row is the FIRST one, 1912-1914. The revival is a separate row. Two dimensions from the plain VPK: lens class and focusing. 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
Zeiss Kodak Anastigmat f/6.9
Rangefinder
No
Alternate Names
—
Introduced
1912
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