Photos from Japan in the 1950s

peterm1

peterm1

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I stumbled on the following article from The Atlantic which is full of images from Japan in the 1950s. I just thought that folks here might enjoy them.

I especially like the photo of workers in the Nikon plant in 1952 (photo 12) and of photo reporters wielding large format press cameras (photo 23). For some weird reason I really like image 37 too - a young woman in a car with a portable TV.

https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2014/03/japan-in-the-1950s/100697/
 
PS - and afterthought.

Image 30 in the link from my first post below should be of special interest to photographers. It depicts the Buddhist Goddess of Mercy known in Chinese as Guan Yin.

Anyone know why I say this? :)

main_1200.jpg
 
Japanese language rendering of 觀音 (Guanyin in Mandarin) can be romanised as Kannon <-- Canon.

Current legal name of Canon Inc uses katakana instead of the above Kanji and transliterates as kiyanon blah blah the rest of it.
 
peterm1 said:
I stumbled on the following article from The Atlantic which is full of images from Japan in the 1950s. I just thought that folks here might enjoy them.

I especially like the photo of workers in the Nikon plant in 1952 (photo 12)...

https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2014/03/japan-in-the-1950s/100697/
Click to expand...

Very interesting, thanks for sharing! Any resident Nikon historians know what lens is being assembled? Looks to be a LTM rangefinder lens with an infinity lock, but beyond that, it's hard for me to tell. It looks too short to be one of the telephoto lenses, but also a bit larger than one of the 5cm f/2 or f/1.4 normal lenses.

I actually have a lens of this era, the Nikkor-P.C 8.5cm f/2 LTM. By serial number, my copy dates back to ~1951. :eek:

 
kinch123 said:
Japanese language rendering of 觀音 (Guanyin in Mandarin) can be romanised as Kannon <-- Canon.

Current legal name of Canon Inc uses katakana instead of the above Kanji and transliterates as kiyanon blah blah the rest of it.
Click to expand...

This man wins a prize. Well, a gold star at least.

51Y4UIq7iML._UY395_.jpg
 
kinch123 said:
Japanese language rendering of 觀音 (Guanyin in Mandarin) can be romanised as Kannon <-- Canon.

Current legal name of Canon Inc uses katakana instead of the above Kanji and transliterates as kiyanon blah blah the rest of it.
Click to expand...

To go a little further down the rabbit hole... Avalokiteśvara > 觀音 (Guanyin) > also known in Japan as Kanzeon or Kannon > Kwanon > Canon. You can read more about the history here on Canon's own website:
https://global.canon/en/c-museum/history/story01.html
 
peterm1 said:
I stumbled on the following article from The Atlantic which is full of images from Japan in the 1950s. I just thought that folks here might enjoy them.

I especially like the photo of workers in the Nikon plant in 1952 (photo 12) and of photo reporters wielding large format press cameras (photo 23). For some weird reason I really like image 37 too - a young woman in a car with a portable TV.

https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2014/03/japan-in-the-1950s/100697/
Click to expand...

Thank you for this, Peter, nothing better than old pictures to bring a smile to my face. I love the hula-hoop girl the best!

Mike
 
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