leica index

This directory contains photos of my dad's Leica M3 35mm camera.

I inherited dad's Leica when he died in 1987. At that time, I also saved my dad's Leica paperwork file folder. Thirty years later, in 2017, I looked at the file as I wrote this page. In addition to some Leica advertising brochures, the file contains a letter written on 7/09/1956 from my brother David (then 16 years old) to my dad, typed on thin airmail paper. Dave was an exchange student in Wiesbaden (West Germany) that summer. He wrote this letter from Bremen with detailed price information in DM and $ on German cameras, including Leica M3 and Minox. My dad noted in pencil the cost of the M3 with Summarit lens plus a wide angle lens: $343.78. Dave bought the Leica for my dad later that summer, cost as noted on a separate page with more notations by my dad.

Specs:

Format: 35mm
Case: two original brown leather cases (one fits 35mm lens, one fits 50mm lens)
Lens: 35 mm f/2.8 Summaron with rangefinder
Lens: 50 mm f/1.5 Summarit
Lens: 50 mm f/2.8 Elmar [collapsible]
Lens: 135 mm f/2.8 Elmarit Leitz Canada with rangefinder
Light meter: two Leica Meter MR, one with original box; also Leica-Meter booster in leather case
Tripod: Leitz Wetzlar Leica 14100 mini tripod with original box