Elgeet
photography related industry in Rochester (New York) |
American Camera | Bausch & Lomb | Blair | Century | Crown Optical Co. | Elgeet | Folmer & Schwing | Gassner and Marx | Graflex | Gundlach | Ilex | JML | Kodak | Milburn | Monroe | PMC | Ray | Reichenbach, Morey and Will | Rochester Camera and Supply Co. | Rochester Optical Co. | Rochester Panoramic Camera Co. | Seneca | Sunart | Walker | Webster Industries | Wollensak |
and in Rochester (Minnesota) |
Conley |
external links |
graflex.org - Rudolf Kingslake's "Optical industry in Rochester (N.Y.)" |
The Elgeet Optical Company was founded in 1946 by David Goldstein in Rochester. Among its first products were lenses for naval tracking, giving the company's lens brand name Navitar. Most known photographic lenses of Elgeet were for movie cameras, but at least one still camera tele lens was made for the American Clarus Model MS-35 rangefinder camera body. In 1955 the company made its fast Elgeet Golden Navitar 12mm f/1.2 wide angle lens for 16mm film which was the World's first mass production of an aspheric lens. Elgeet was also a renowned maker of enlarger lenses. One of the enlarger lens types, the Elgeet 90mm f:6.3 Anastigmat, was chosen as camera lens type for a special still camera, i.e. Avant's Quad Camera for making passport photos.
Elgeet advertised itself as "Makers of the World’s Finest Lenses". Since 1993 the company is named Navitar.
Elgeet Navitar 10"/4.5 on bellows image by luisalegria (Image rights) |
Elgeet enlarger lenses image by luisalegria (Image rights) |