14 and 12 researched events on one shared scale. Graflex 1887–present, Kodak 1880–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.
William F. Folmer and William E. Schwing began in New York with metalwork, lighting and bicycles, then moved steadily into photographic goods. Their 1890 incorporation and camera offerings of the mid-1890s established the enterprise that would become one of Rochester's defining professional-camera makers.
Folmer & Schwing 1898 Catalog · A History of Rochester Camera and Lens Companies
Folmer & Schwing's own camera line emerged in the 1890s. The 1898 catalog presents Graphic, Graphic Senior, Cycle Graphic and stereoscopic cameras in several plate formats, alongside a broad lens trade. These compact field cameras supplied the name and practical folding architecture from which later Graphic systems grew.
Folmer & Schwing 1898 Catalog · A History of Rochester Camera and Lens Companies
William Folmer's reflex-camera work joined through-the-lens viewing to a focal-plane shutter. Kingslake dates the first experimental Graflex to 1898 and describes the decisive 1904 change to a dependable curtain with fixed-width apertures, a pattern that became the mechanical signature of Graflex reflex and Speed Graphic cameras.
A History of Rochester Camera and Lens Companies · Graflex 1906 Catalog
George Eastman purchased Folmer & Schwing in 1905 and moved the operation to Rochester. The organization became a Kodak division and later the Folmer-Century operation, bringing Century's view and Cirkut panoramic lines into the same professional-camera shop while William Folmer remained general manager through 1926.
A History of Rochester Camera and Lens Companies · Graflex Corporate History · Graflex 1920 Catalog
Auto, Revolving Back, Press, Naturalist, Series B, Series C, Series D and Home Portrait cameras turned the large-format reflex idea into a broad working system. Formats ranged from compact roll-film sizes to 5 x 7, with the mirror and hood giving photographers an upright, full-size image for focusing before exposure.
Graflex 1939 Product Catalog · Graflex 1941 Catalog · Major Graflex Products · Graflex 1920 Catalog · Graflex 1906 Catalog
The Speed Graphic placed Graflex's curtain shutter in a folding, direct-view camera. Top-handle, larger-board, Pre-Anniversary and Anniversary generations expanded lens choice and refined focusing and handling. By the 1930s and 1940s the camera had become closely identified with American news and military photography.
Graflex 1939 Product Catalog · Graflex 1941 Catalog · Graflex Graphic Model History · Graflex Speed Graphic 4x5 Press Camera · Graflex 1920 Catalog
A court-directed divestiture separated Kodak's professional-camera operation. The Folmer Graflex Corporation took over the assets and continued in Rochester, carrying forward Graflex, Graphic, Cirkut and studio equipment through the Depression and wartime production before the corporate name became Graflex, Inc. in the mid-1940s.
Graflex 1939 Product Catalog · Graflex 1941 Catalog · A History of Rochester Camera and Lens Companies · Graflex Corporate History · Graflex 1927 Catalog
The wooden Crown View was followed by the metal Graphic View and longer-rail Graphic View II. These cameras put generous rise, shift, swing and tilt into studio and location tools, sharing selected boards or adapters with Graphic cameras and giving architectural and industrial photographers a distinctly modern American view-camera option.
Graflex 1939 Product Catalog · Graflex 1941 Catalog · Major Graflex Products · Graflex 1958 Price List
Anniversary and military Graphics, the Combat Graphic, Super D and postwar Pacemaker series carried the company through wartime and into a changed press market. Institutions and working photographers valued robust construction, interchangeable holders and the ability to combine rangefinder, scale and ground-glass focusing on one body.
Dated in the sources as “1940s-1950s”. Decade wording normalized to its full calendar span for scaling.
Gottlieb's Life and Work · Graflex 1941 Catalog · Graflex 1958 Price List · Graflex Speed Graphic 4x5 Press Camera
Pacemaker Speed and Crown Graphics standardized the postwar folding platform, while the Century Graphic adapted its ideas to 2 1/4 x 3 1/4. Super Graphic and Super Speed Graphic added a revolving Graflok back, built-in rangefinding and electrical shutter features, carrying large-format versatility to the end of production.
Graflex Graphic Model History · Major Graflex Products · Graflex 1958 Price List · Graflex 1968 Product Catalog
Graflex acquired the Ciro camera line and sold Ciro-flex, Graflex 22, Graphic 35, Century 35, Stereo Graphic and Graphic 70 cameras. These 120, 35mm stereo and 70mm products widened the badge beyond Rochester's traditional reflex and press cameras, though several compact lines depended on acquired or imported manufacture.
General Precision Equipment acquired Graflex in 1956, and the company moved to a new Monroe Avenue plant near Pittsford in 1957. The catalog still centered on professional Graphic cameras, film holders and lighting, while product development reached toward lighter Super models and new medium-format systems.
Graflex 1958 Price List · A History of Rochester Camera and Lens Companies · Graflex Corporate History · Graflex 1968 Product Catalog
The XL replaced the folding bed with a modular medium-format body, dedicated focusing barrels and interchangeable roll, sheet and instant-film backs. Rangefinder, Standard and thin Super Wide Angle bodies accepted lenses from Zeiss, Schneider and Rodenstock, making the last Graflex camera system unlike its press-camera ancestors.
Singer's ownership carried Graflex cameras into the early 1970s, but camera manufacture ended in 1973 and tooling was sold to Toyo. The original manufacturing company did not continue as a camera maker; surviving cameras, manuals and the specialist community now carry the name's practical and historical continuity.
George Eastman began commercial dry-plate manufacture in Rochester in 1880 and formed the Eastman Dry Plate Company with Henry Strong on 1 January 1881. The partnership became the Eastman Dry Plate and Film Company in 1884, the Eastman Company in 1889, and Eastman Kodak Company of New York in 1892.
The factory-loaded Kodak camera went on sale in 1888 with film for one hundred circular exposures and a return-to-Rochester processing, printing, and reloading service. The transparent roll film marketed in 1889 and the one-dollar Brownie introduced in 1900 extended Kodak's consumer system.
Kodak opened its first manufacturing plant outside the United States at Harrow, England, in 1891. In Rochester it renamed the former Blair Camera factory Hawk-Eye Works in 1911 and established optical design there in 1912; Kodak's own 1942 lens manual states that the company began making simple-type lenses in 1912 and soon followed with Kodak Anastigmats.
Kodak expanded through Brownie boxes, Folding Pocket and Vest Pocket cameras, Autographic models, Panoram swing-lens cameras, professional and Premo equipment, and many film-number families. Model number, picture size, film number, body construction, lens, and shutter package changed independently and must not be collapsed into one generic Kodak chronology.
Dated in the sources as “1900s-1930s”. Decade wording normalized to its full calendar span for scaling.
History of KODAK Cameras, customer service pamphlet AA-13 · Kodak and Premo Camera Chronology
The 16mm Cine-Kodak camera, projector, and film system appeared in 1923, and Kodak introduced an 8mm amateur motion-picture system in 1932. These systems extended the company's integrated camera-film-processing-projector model beyond still photography.
History of KODAK Cameras, customer service pamphlet AA-13 · Milestones · Kodak and Premo Camera Chronology
Kodak bought the Nagel Camera Company in Stuttgart in 1931. Kodak A.G. introduced the Retina in 1934 and developed folding rangefinders, rigid Retinas, Retinettes, Retina Reflex cameras, and later other German-made equipment. Retina C-series cameras used convertible front components matched to a fixed rear cell, whereas the rigid Retina IIIS used fully interchangeable lenses; these systems are not mutually equivalent.
Dated in the sources as “1931-1960s”. Mixed decade and year wording normalized for scaling.
Milestones · Kodak and Premo Camera Chronology · The Retina Guide
Rochester precision cameras included the Bantam Special, Super Kodak Six-20, Kodak 35 and 35 Rangefinder, Ektra, Medalist and Medalist II, and Signet 35. They span 828, 620, and 135 formats; fixed, unit-focusing, and interchangeable optics; leaf and focal-plane shutters; and different meter or rangefinder arrangements.
Kodak Lenses, Shutters and Portra Lenses, fourth edition · History of KODAK Cameras, customer service pamphlet AA-13 · Milestones · Kodak and Premo Camera Chronology
Kodak documented inner air-glass surface treatment in 1940 and later marketed magnesium-fluoride-coated optics as Lumenized, commonly marked with a circled L. Its 1946 data book renamed Kodak Anastigmat Special as Anastar and Kodak Anastigmat as Anaston while explicitly stating that the renaming did not change the optical formulas. The 1952 data book distinguished Ektar, Anastar, Anaston, Kodar, Kodet, enlarging, projection, and camera-specific families.
Kodak Lenses, Range Finders and Shutters · Kodak Lenses, Shutters and Portra Lenses, fourth edition · Kodak Lens Manual
Kodak introduced the 126 Instamatic system in 1963 and the 110 Pocket Instamatic system in 1972. The film cartridges, body sizes, exposure systems, flash arrangements, and production branches differ, so the Instamatic name cannot stand in for one format or one body platform.
History of KODAK Cameras, customer service pamphlet AA-13 · Milestones
Kodak engineer Steven Sasson built a completely digital camera prototype in 1975. Kodak subsequently developed professional DCS, consumer digital, sensor, printer, and workflow products while chemical film and camera lines contracted. The digital invention belongs to Kodak's technical history but does not make every later Kodak-branded digital camera a Rochester-manufactured product.
Dated in the sources as “1975-2000s”. Mixed decade and year wording normalized for scaling.
Milestones · Photographic Processes Video Series & Glossary - Digital Photography
Eastman Kodak entered Chapter 11 in 2012 and emerged as a reorganized company on 3 September 2013. The restructuring transferred Personalized Imaging and Document Imaging to the Kodak Pension Plan of the U.K. subsidiary; those businesses subsequently formed a separate Kodak Alaris continuity rather than an uninterrupted Eastman Kodak operating division.
Eastman Kodak Company Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2025 · Kodak Emerges as Technology Company Focused on Imaging for Business
The current New Jersey Eastman Kodak Company remains headquartered at 343 State Street in Rochester. Its 2025 Form 10-K identifies Print, Advanced Materials and Chemicals, and Brand segments; the company manufactures professional and consumer still film and motion-picture film, while its Brand segment licenses the Kodak name for third-party digital, instant-print, and 35mm cameras and other consumer products.
Brand Licensing · Eastman Kodak Company Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2025
