A Minor Mystery

[David Hughes]

Hi,

One of my cameras came with the original receipt for it's purchase in 1969 at 47 Roubles (about UKP 31 then) but the receipt and passport for the camera have the same date and the receipt is headed 'ГУТ МО СССР' but what does that mean?

I guess is along the lines of 'Заказ мо СССР' but what does 'ГУТ' mean? And why would the USSR Ministry of Defence be selling a brand new camera on the day it left the factory?

Any ideas, anyone?

Regards, David

 

[sevo]

That will probably a USSR equivalent of PX sold cameras. And assuming that the USSR did not do something unique with its warranty start date, it is the date of sale, not the date of manufacture...

 

[David Hughes]

That will probably a USSR equivalent of PX sold cameras. And assuming that the USSR did not do something unique with its warranty start date, it is the date of sale, not the date of manufacture...

Thanks I've edited the original question to make it clearer...

Regards, David

 

[Crazy Fedya]

I think ГУТ МО СССР stands for Главное Управление Торговли Министерства Обороны СССР, which means something like Supreme Trade Bureau for Department of Defence of USSR.
Заказ МО translates as Dept od Defence PO.
I can speculate, that both documents were filled out at the factory, as it was sold to ГУТ МО СССР.

 

[David Hughes]

Hi,

Many thanks, that starts to make sense of it as the receipt also has printed on it 'Central Dept. Store' and has a MO printer's code. All the others have FED printer's codes.

To add to the fun the three part 'passport' from FED has been rubber stamped 'ЦУМ ГУТ МО СССР' with what I can just decipher as 'Moscow' and an address. Alas, the rubber stamp was very faded and the only other word readable is 'товаров' and a number.

Bitter experience at the time tells me I'll never get my hands on a Moscow telephone directory for 1969.

Has anyone else any info?

Thanks again.

Regards, David