Werner

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Camera industry in Dresden
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Camera distributors in Dresden
Stöckig
Camera industry in Freital
Beier | Pouva | Thowe | Welta

Gebrüder Werner (GW) (Werner Brothers) was a company in Tharanth, near Dresden, which made shutters. Founded by Otto and Alfred Werner in 1912 as a small camera workshop in Deuben, they moved their growing business with leaf shutters to Tharandt in 1923[1]. Their shutters were exclusively two-blade leaf shutters with automatic cocking (by pressing the release button), and quite simple technology with a limited number of shutter settings (mostly 25-50-100 and B)[2]. Brandnames used were Junior, Binor and Stelo. The shutters carry the company logo, GW in a circle. However, GW also toll produced shutters for Woldemar Beier (just a few kilometers away), recognizable by a B in this circle.
After WWII the company made Junior and Junior-II shutters for the East German camera industry. From the mid 1950ies, the company was more and more controlled by the socialistic government and was nationalized in 1972 as VEB Fotoverschlüsse Tharandt and eventually embedded into the network of the Pentacon industry conglomerate. After nationalization, the company was managed by Ernst Gunkel (Otto Werner's son-in-law), who was also in charge of other parts of the conglomerate. The site in Tharandt kept producing camera parts until the closure in mid-1990. The late product range included parts for various Certo models. However, he majority of the workload for the approx. 30 employees concerned still shutters (including for the various Beirette models: Junior/Junior II shutters, Juniormat shutters, Priomat shutters, parts for the Beirette electronic program shutter)[3].

Notes

  1. Hartmut Thiele, Die Deutsche Photoindustrie - Wer war Wer, 8th edition, Munich 2021.
  2. "Pronto, Presto, Subito" at Zeissikonveb.de (in German).
  3. Werner, Tharandt at Dresdner Kameras (in German).