Old Correspondence between E. Leitz and my father

[Tony Rowlett]

I'm not sure if this will really be that interesting to you, but, to

me, I am fascinated by some old correspondence between my father (now

84) and the New York offices of E. Leitz. These letters were written

between October of 1958 and February of 1960, shortly after my folks

moved to Fairbanks, Alaska, and a couple of years before I was born.

<p>

The letters my father wrote are on this really thin, nearly

"parchment-like" paper; the kind you can practically take a photograph

through and get a dreamy picture. It would definitely make great

tracing paper.

<p>

The one thing that really strikes me is the nearly overwhelming

kindness and high level of propriety that is displayed by the

correspondents. It really does take me back in time to a period I've

never really known.

<p>

Another thing that strikes me is the large amount of customer-support

attention that not only my dad seems to expect, but also what is

actually given him by a large company. Can you imagine what level of

service you'd receive from some big company if they received a letter

written today in the style which my father wrote in those days?

<p>

Anyway... have a look. These thumbnails are clickable to view the

large versions, and they're also all in a <a

href="http://www.photo.net/photodb/folder.tcl?folder_id=545414">folder

in my photo.net gallery</a>, but they're in reverse chronological

order there (newest to oldest). Here, they are in proper order. I

scanned them on a really cheap-o scanner and tried to sharpen them so

that they're readable, and most are except the first one in 1958...

it's even hard to read in real life.

<p>

<center>

<a href="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/3890594-lg.jpg">

<img src="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/3890594-sm.jpg"></a>

<br>Letter to E. Leitz from Dad

<br>October 26, 1958

<p>

<a href="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/3890602-lg.jpg">

<img src="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/3890602-sm.jpg"></a>

<a href="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/3890610-lg.jpg">

<img src="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/3890610-sm.jpg"></a>

<br>Letter to Dad from E. Leitz

<br>December 4, 1959

<p>

<a href="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/3890615-lg.jpg">

<img src="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/3890615-sm.jpg"></a>

<br>Letter to E. Leitz from Dad

<br>December 7. 1959

<p>

<a href="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/3890617-lg.jpg">

<img src="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/3890617-sm.jpg"></a>

<br>Letter to Dad from E. Leitz

<br>December 9, 1959

<p>

<a href="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/3890618-lg.jpg">

<img src="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/3890618-sm.jpg"></a>

<br>Another Letter from E. Leitz to Dad

<br>December 29, 1959

<p>

<a href="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/3890621-lg.jpg">

<img src="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/3890621-sm.jpg"></a>

<br>Letter to E. Leitz from Dad

<br>January 10, 1960

<p>

<a href="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/3890624-lg.jpg">

<img src="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/3890624-sm.jpg"></a>

<br>Letter to Dad from E. Leitz

<br>February 19, 1960

<br>(he finally got his enlarging easel!)

</center>

<p>

Ah well... It's just a little trip back in history for me.

[al_kaplan1]

Thanks Tony. The business world was very different back then. That ultra thin paper had to do with the cost of postage. First class letters went by rail and truck, which took maybe a week to get across the country. It cost 3 cents an ounce, and typewriter keyboards still had a symbol for "cents". Airmail would get your letter from New York to the west coast in perhaps three days, two if you were lucky. It cost 6 cents for a half ounce. Folks wanted their airmail letters to go as cheaply as possible, hence the lightweight paper and matching envelopes.

[rjm photo]

Sure Tony, that is when things were more "civil". There were no fax machines, email, voicemail...etc. There was more a human touch, the representatives at Leitz first read your Dad's letter...then probably dictated the reply to a secretary who then typed (in 1959-60) an orginal letter with carbon copies, and the representative signed it, carefully folded it in thirds and mailed it to your Dad...most likely with a stamp...I'm not certain if postage meters were in use then, I can't remember.

 

Such odd behavior was still in vogue when I got into business in the mid to late sixties. I would guess somewhere around the early 80's new electronics doomed us to the absolute impersonal (but more efficient) level of business communications most of us experience today.

 

The letters of your Dad are neat...and they exhibit the grace and politeness that used to be a hallmark of most of what was done ....in times past.

[terry_rory]

Dear Tony,

 

I am 'only' 46 years old but I remember as a small child being taught by my parents to write letters at a very early age. (Applications to clubs, thank-you letters for birthday/Christmas presents, invitations to parties etc.)

 

Our bookshelves included a book on letter writing including all the (now mostly archaic) correct means of addressing different people depending on their position/title and the correct or most appropriate ways of addressing people and signing off. (Yours sincerely, Yours faithfully, best wishes etc depending upon your level of familiarity with the correspondent.)

 

I wonder if people a generation earlier (of your grandfather's generation) despaired of all the 'impersonal' typewritten letters compared to a time when people actually penned letters in their own hand? I marvel at the 'copperplate' hand writing standards of even casual correspondence from centuries past.

 

I have recently experienced two examples of corporate communication (via e-mail) from an ISP I have recently parted from and another that I have just joined. I can assure you that the tone of correspondence is markedly better from the new provider (Waitrose.com) and resembles that which your examples (displayed above) provided. The tone of the e-mail correspondence from the old provider (Tiscali) was akin to that of a surly teenager rather than a business and service provider.

 

The syntax of the average modern business e-mail is positively 'Dickensian' though, when compared to texting language.

 

Thank-you again for an interesting and thought provoking example of everyday history that highlights the contrasts of the present day to the recent past. (I like to think of 1959 as the recent past as I was born then!)

 

Yours sincerely,

 

Trevor Hare

[dan_fromm1]

Tony,

 

The entire world jumps on Bob Salomon of HP Marketing for mentioning the lines HP carries when he enters on-line discussions, but his responses are concise, polite, and to the point. He behaves the same way in telephone conversations and in written correspondence. The old ways haven't died everywhere.

 

FWIW, I don't work for HP Marketing or any of the manufacturers whose products they sell. I've got useful information and good help from him when I've needed it. As far as I'm concerned he's a powerful force for good.

 

Onion skin paper. Oh my, takes me back to my youth.

 

Cheers,

[vivek iyer]

Interesting post that gives a glimpse of history. Thanks, Tony.

 

I am several years younger to Trevor but what he describes about letter writing practice holds true for me as well. Perhaps, like him I was one of the early ones to get to use email (and bitnet) at the university.

 

Corporate communication has not changed much (depending on the people one deals with). The correspondence I have received from Dr. Kornelius Mueller (Zeiss) to my queries were very polite and up to the point. So are some others from some Microfilm distributors and agents.

[roland_schmid]

I have a similar conversation because of a vacuum cleaner.

[tom h.]

I spent the last 18 months in Germany and had to send Leica two cameras to Solms for repair, a focus misaligned M6ttl(my fault,dropped it) and a shutterless M7(their fault,failed on the fifth roll).On both occasions within three days I received a confirmation-of-receipt letter which detailed the required repairs and the estimated cost(free, both times). I called them a couple of times, and their service rep was helpful, efficient, and well informed. In my experience they're still as classy and "old school" an outfit as you could hope to find.Comes from pride in their work, I imagine- not such an easy thing to find these days. And the stuff came back like new.Thanks for sharing, Tony.

[oceanphysics]

<i>I can assure you that the tone of correspondence is markedly better from the new provider (Waitrose.com) and resembles that which your examples (displayed above) provided.</i>

<p>

You're lucky if you got them to correspond with you at all. Some modern companies actively seek to minimize communications with customers.

<p>

I spent several weeks trying to straighten out a situation with my former (and <i>never again</i>) Internet/cable provider (Charter Communications), wherein they continued to charge me for service for months after I'd asked for it to be disconnected, and wound up owing me almost $500. But the only number they'd give me was an 800 number, which would connect to a different customer service rep every time. So after 20 minutes on hold I'd have to spend another 20 minutes getting a new customer service person caught up on the situation, at which point I'd get a completely different story. The new idiot would have no idea why the old idiot had told me what he told me and would feel no obligation whatsoever to live up to any promises the old idiot had made. There was often the vague suggestion that I'd imagined them. This went on for weeks.

<p>

As the saying goes -- if this is a service economy, where is the service?

[Jochen_S]

Tony, I'm rather young but have been brought up besides a fully mechanical typewriter. - As far as I remember this ultra thin paper you mentioned was used for carbon copys. Means you wrote the real letter to be posted directly on good ordinary paper but had a carbon paper under this and the thin one to keep a copy, to proof that and what you have written. This paper was thin to allow a sandwich of letter, carbon, 1st copy, carbon, 2nd copy, maybe even a 3rd copy without making the last copy unreadable because a thicker sandwich would diffuse the typing more severely. Under a linnentester the typing of your dad's letters should look a bit washed out.

 

Does anybody know a homepage teaching writing letters properly in a not too out of fashion style let's say up to date enough like a M3 and not contemporary to 13x18 Reisekamera?

 

Oh yeah, this kind of customer service your letters are proofing was really great. Today we can maybe only dream about something like that to appear again.

 

As far as I remember Í tried to contact Leica Germany twice and got only one reply telling me to ask Fujifilm for customer support with the old Digilux (which was the only digicam I could borrow these days and I'm glad about not needing it anymore), but well I had expected more from Leica.

[david_n.]

These letters are very cool. Not long ago, I had to e-mail Roger Horn with a problem I was having with the service department, and his response was almost immediate and very cordial.

[terry_rory]

Jochen a suggestion...

 

<a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0007208685/qid=1132449401/sr=2-2/ref=sr_2_3_2/203-2391754-3419122">Good writing guide</a>

[terry_rory]

Jochen if you wish to improve your general writing abilities beyond this then my wife recommends:- 'On Writing' by Stephen King and 'The Elements of Style' by William Strunk and E.B. White.

 

(Yes THAT Stephen King.)

[terry_rory]

OK Jochen, me again. Do not buy Strunk White's.. "The Elements of Style".

 

Instead bookmark this....

 

http://sut1.sut.ac.th/strunk/

 

The whole book is online!

[lee hamiel]

Thanks Tony for one of the more meaningful posts in a while - blast from the past.

 

As I believe Dan mentioned this is classic onion skin paper - lost art in letters these days with computers & injet printers - I have sometimes used parchment paper for letters printed off the printer - closest thing that works :)

 

Kudos to Trevor's references for letter writing - I am a few years older I'm guessing and these traits are slowly being lost. My two daughters at 21 & 27 are the closest I have had in terms of classic letter writing although it's easier to simply call on the cell phone & chat & catch up on details.

 

I did have a situation with Leica a year or so ago where my son sold most of his equipment in order to buy a new M7 & a 35 lens & he had a major shutter problem right away. After we emailed Leica beforehand for the passport service I emailed Leica directly at Solms & JJ responded & he was the consumate gentleman & unfortunately I lost the correspondence as my computer died & I did not back up these emails. He advised me who to ask for, what to ask to be done as well as telling me to ask for an MP viewfinder upgrade that would be included for no cost.

 

Long story short - new shutter/new MP viewfinder upgrade & happy campers all around.

 

Although we tend to view the big companies as large corporations it is the many people involved that ultimately make up the company & hopefully this does not get lost in the next generation.

[terry_rory]

Jim, if you read what Jochen wrote you will see he requested...

 

"Does anybody know a homepage teaching writing letters properly in a not too out of fashion style"

 

I was suggesting ideas for him, as he asked, and NOT being rude.

[terry_rory]

Jochen, I hope you did not interpret my suggestions as insulting.

 

Jim thought they were so I am concerned that you might also.

 

I was honestly responding in good faith to your request for sites on guides to letter writing/writing and my sincere apologies if you took my suggestions the way Jim did. That was not what I intended.

[gerry_szarek]

Ocean Physics time to get a lawyer, it usually cuts thru the idots pretty quickly.

 

Tony, if you put a piece of white paper behind the letter it will scan better.

 

Gerry

[Tony Rowlett]

Whoa, thanks for the advice... I'll try it. Makes perfect sense, too.

[Brad_]

Really cool, Tony. Interesting how more thoughtful letters seemed to be before the age of

email.

[dr._karl_hoppe]

A very interesting thread and a glimpse into the "old school" ways of business relations. And before typewriters, people actually handwrote letters with correct grammar, spelling and punctuation.

 

One of my friend's great grandfathers travelled throughout the Orient for months---mostly China---in the 1920's as a young man and dutifully wrote a letter every evening to the folks back home detailing his adventures. The letters form a veritable diary of his exploits. They were all written in pencil on onion skin paper. The handwriting is flawless, like calligraphy, and the stories are fascinating.

 

It's a pitty the fellow wasn't a camera bug, oherwise I'm sure my friend would have inherited some great b&w snaps to accompany the wonderful narrative. A much more genteel time.

[dan flanders]

Tony: When I fell in the Gulkana river and drowned my brand new Leica M2 your dad was kind enough to write Leitz NY for me when I was told by the local dealer that the camera was a total loss. That was too long a story for this forum, but your dad was my neighbor in the old Northward Building and we worked together in several ventures, mostly in those days involving bicycles, recorded music, and cameras.<p> "Those were the days, my friend; we thought they'd never end!" <p>Thanks for recalling those fond memories. Dan Flanders, aka you know who.

[lawrence_bochkis]

While I'm still young, I grew up writing letters, and my parents come from Europe, where even today politeness reigns compared to the US, etc.

 

Oddly, I find that the more polite and concise my letters to manufacturers and so on are, the less responses I get overall. It seems these days that not only are people rude, but they expect to be treated rudely.

 

Strange...

[frederick_muller]

My Dad used to keep a ream (which I guess is a package of 500 sheets) of "Onion Skin" paper in his desk. Every so often, he'd give me a few sheets for tracing. Brings back memories!

[Tony Rowlett]

Peter, yep, it was pretty much due to my father's history using Leica cameras beginning when my grandfather bought him his first camera in 1938. It was a G-1938 (IIIb). To this day he not only regrets getting rid of it, he also remembers the serial number and that of the 50mm lens he had with it. When this forum was created, I was seriously surprised that it had not already existed!