14 and 12 researched events on one shared scale. Bausch & Lomb 1853–present, Konica 1873–present.
The axis stretches where either maker has research and collapses where neither does, so a year sits opposite the same year on both. Event counts differ because research depth differs, not because one company did less.
John Jacob Bausch opened a small optical shop in Rochester in 1853. Henry Lomb, another German immigrant, lent him $60 and became his partner. Their early trade centered on imported spectacles and optical goods, but the partnership paired Bausch's practical lens work with Lomb's commercial discipline.
A History of Rochester Camera and Lens Companies · History & Heritage
During the Civil War, imported horn for eyeglass frames became scarce. Bausch adapted Charles Goodyear's vulcanite hard rubber to frame production in 1861, giving the firm a scalable American-made product. The business used the Vulcanite Optical Instrument name before returning to Bausch & Lomb Optical Company in 1876.
A History of Rochester Camera and Lens Companies · History & Heritage
Rokusaburo Sugiura began selling lithographic and photographic tools and materials at Konishiya Rokubeiten in Kojimachi, Tokyo, then established his own Konishi Honten business in Nihonbashi. By 1882 the firm was making lightproof photographic boxes, an early move from importing and retailing into domestic production.
History: 1873-1959 Cameras and Film—The Beginnings / Steps to a Global Company · Company Overview
Microscope production began in the mid-1870s and pushed the Rochester works toward precision optical manufacture. By 1883 the company was making photographic lenses. That sequence matters: photography grew from an established instrument shop with glassworking, mechanical, and measurement skills rather than from a camera cabinetmaker.
A History of Rochester Camera and Lens Companies · History & Heritage
The company expanded practical manufacturing around photography and lithography, building the skills needed to supply a young Japanese photographic culture. That foundation led to the 1903 Sakura Hakkin photographic paper and Cherry Hand Camera, products that joined the light-sensitive material and the picture-making instrument under one house.
History: 1873-1959 Cameras and Film—The Beginnings / Steps to a Global Company · Replica of Cherry Portable Camera
Edward Bausch patented a between-the-lens iris diaphragm and shutter in 1887, and commercial shutter manufacture followed. Bausch & Lomb soon supplied both essential sides of the camera's optical package. A surviving circa-1895 stereo camera shows lenses, pneumatic shutter, focus, and movements combined in a complete instrument.
Folding plate stereoscopic camera · A History of Rochester Camera and Lens Companies · History & Heritage
An 1892 agreement made Bausch & Lomb the American producer of important Zeiss anastigmat designs. Planar, Unar, Tessar, and Protar names joined Rochester-made Plastigmat and Universal lenses. The initial contractual era changed during the First World War, yet Bausch & Lomb catalogs continued several design names afterward.
Semi-Centennial Catalog: Photographic Lenses, Shutters and Apparatus · A History of Rochester Camera and Lens Companies · Photographic Lenses and Shutters, F-11 V-28
By 1903 the company reported roughly half a million photographic lenses and 550,000 shutters made. Catalogs from 1904, 1920, and 1928 reveal a striking range: still-camera, portrait, process, projection, photomicrographic, telephoto, wide-angle, and motion-picture optics, backed by Rochester optical-glass work.
Bausch & Lomb Photographic Lenses, Shutters and Accessories · Semi-Centennial Catalog: Photographic Lenses, Shutters and Apparatus · A History of Rochester Camera and Lens Companies · Photographic Lenses and Shutters, F-11 V-28
The Cherry Hand Camera appeared in 1903 as a branded, mass-produced Japanese camera for amateur use, while Sakura paper anchored the materials side. Konishi Honten broadened the camera range during the following decades, founded a professional photography school in 1923, and introduced Sakura Film for general photography in 1929.
History: 1873-1959 Cameras and Film—The Beginnings / Steps to a Global Company · Systematic Survey on 35 mm High End Camera · Replica of Cherry Portable Camera
Motion pictures asked for speed, even coverage, reliable focusing mounts, and repeatable manufacture. The 1928 catalog paired f/3.5 cine Tessars with a 50 mm f/2.7 Ultra Rapid Anastigmat. Later Baltars extended that cinema branch, preparing the ground for the better-documented Super Baltar series.
Super Baltar Lenses · Photographic Lenses and Shutters, F-11 V-28
The Konishi Professional School of Photography linked the company to photographic education, while Sakura Film brought in-house sensitized-material production to general photographers. The business reorganized as a joint-stock company in 1936 and announced Sakura Natural Color Film in 1940, the first Japanese-made color film in the company's chronology.
History: 1873-1959 Cameras and Film—The Beginnings / Steps to a Global Company · Systematic Survey on 35 mm High End Camera
As Konishiroku became an incorporated photographic manufacturer, its prewar Pearl folding cameras shared the range with sensitized materials and optical work. During the war the company developed and produced military aerial cameras. Civilian production resumed afterward, and the Konica I brought the Konica name to a 35mm camera by 1948.
History: 1873-1959 Cameras and Film—The Beginnings / Steps to a Global Company · Systematic Survey on 35 mm High End Camera · Konishiroku Konica I Cs
Bausch & Lomb's Metrogon adapted wide-angle optical thinking to aerial mapping. Period technical literature describes lenses selected for large negatives and controlled distortion, including the widely used 6-inch f/6.3 class. A Harvard collection specimen preserves the K-22 association and physical evidence.
Some Recent Developments in the Photogrammetric Equipment Field · Metrogon wide angle aircraft lens
The fixed-lens Konica I established a durable camera brand within Konishiroku, alongside Pearl folding cameras and other popular formats. Hexar and Hexanon names became closely associated with the firm's lenses. In 1960 the ambitious Konica F carried the company into interchangeable-lens 35mm SLRs with a fast metal focal-plane shutter.
Konica F, record 103310371208 · Optical Products · Systematic Survey on 35 mm High End Camera · Konishiroku Konica I Cs
Bausch & Lomb worked with 20th Century-Fox on the combination lenses used for CinemaScope photography. The wide-screen process arrived commercially in 1953, and the Academy's technical awards record recognized both organizations for the lens work. The episode put Rochester optics into a highly visible industrial transition.
Scientific and Technical Awards database · History & Heritage
The Super Baltar cinema family ranged from 20 mm through 9 inches in a 1967 brochure, with faster apertures at the shorter focal lengths. A NASA technical report identifies a 76 mm f/2 Bausch & Lomb Super Baltar in the Ranger camera system, connecting a studio lens line to lunar reconnaissance.
Super Baltar Lenses · The Ranger VII Flight Path and Its Determination From Tracking Data
The Konica F introduced a large lens interface and a vertically travelling metal shutter capable of one two-thousandth of a second, but it was expensive and short-lived. Konishiroku kept developing the idea through later reflex cameras, reaching the Auto-Reflex and then the Autoreflex T, whose open-aperture TTL metering worked with automatic Hexanon lenses.
Konica F, record 103310371208 · Systematic Survey on 35 mm High End Camera · Konica Autoreflex T Instruction Manual
The Auto-Reflex combined a focal-plane shutter, interchangeable lenses and shutter-priority automatic exposure, and could switch between full and half frame. The Autoreflex T moved metering through the lens. Successive AR-mount bodies and Hexanon lenses carried that practical automation into the 1980s before Konica's SLR line wound down.
Systematic Survey on 35 mm High End Camera · Konica Autoreflex T Instruction Manual
The company's photographic achievements remained part of its identity, but eye care increasingly drove the operating business. SofLens contact lenses arrived in 1971, followed by expansion in lens-care, pharmaceutical, and surgical products. By the end of the century, cameras and photographic objectives were legacy fields rather than the corporate center.
The C35EF put a pop-up electronic flash into a compact 35mm camera, with Japanese museum records dating its release to December 1974 and the corporate chronology presenting it as a 1975 milestone. In November 1977 the C35AF added passive triangulation autofocus, turning two frequent causes of failed snapshots into camera-managed tasks.
Konica C35AF, record 103310371356 · Konica C35EF, record 103310371333 · History: 1960-1979 Innovative World Firsts / Rapid Growth of Copier Business
Konica translated camera-lens experience into ultra-precise aspheric plastic optics for compact-disc pickups while continuing photographic work. The Hexar and HEXAR RF kept high-grade 35mm cameras in view, digital Revio models addressed the new market, and camera OEM production grew even as optical components became strategically important.
Annual Report 2001 · History: 1980-2002 Digital Age Impact and New Business Challenges · Optical Products
Konishiroku Photo Industry changed its name to Konica Corporation in 1987 and brought the company's products under the Konica brand. Cameras and films remained visible, but copiers, medical imaging, digital systems and optical components grew in weight. A business-technology partnership with Minolta prepared the ground for their 2003 integration.
Annual Report 2001 · History: 2003 onward — Konica and Minolta Integration · History: 1980-2002 Digital Age Impact and New Business Challenges
Konica and Minolta integrated management in 2003. Konica Minolta withdrew from cameras in March 2006, transferred part of the digital-SLR assets to Sony, ended film and paper production on a staged schedule, and completed photo-sales withdrawal in 2007. The current successor remains an imaging and optics company, but not an own-brand camera maker.
Konica Minolta, Withdrawal Plan for Camera Business and Photo Business · History: 2003 onward — Konica and Minolta Integration · Optical Products · Company Overview
Warburg Pincus completed a take-private acquisition in October 2007 in a transaction valued at about $4.5 billion including debt. Valeant then completed its acquisition in August 2013, making the business a subsidiary. These transactions changed ownership and financing, not the historical attribution of Rochester photographic products.
Valeant acquisition completion filing · Warburg Pincus acquisition completion announcement
Bausch + Lomb returned to public markets in May 2022 under the BLCO symbol while Bausch Health retained a controlling interest. The offering created a separately traded eye-health company but did not revive photographic-lens production. Present corporate status should therefore be kept distinct from the vintage catalog.
Bausch + Lomb Corporation 2025 Form 10-K · Bausch + Lomb initial public offering closing filing
The 2025 annual filing describes a global eye-health company with about 13,000 employees and roughly 400 products, with Bausch Health still holding about 88 percent in February 2026. It also records substantial owned Rochester office, research, and manufacturing space, preserving a real geographic continuity.
Read either maker on its own: Bausch & Lomb · Konica
