We’ll be the first to admit – not an exciting title or topic for a blog. It may even be a stretch for a blog named the ‘Yashica Pentamatic Fanatic’. But we feel compelled to share information about the Yashica Company, however slight and trivial, with our dear readers.

Yashica’s first factory was along the shores of beautiful Lake Suwa. As best as we can tell, the original location (from Yashica brochures) was Shimosuwa-machi, Suwa-gun, Nagano Prefecture. This was the industrial campus of Yashica and it grew over the years to occupy almost every square meter of the property.

Opened in 1956 along the shores of Lake Suwa in Nagano.

Different view of the same campus. Yashica was running out of room by the mid 1960s. 

By the early 1970s, Yashica converted the Katakana silk mill in the neighboring town of Okaya into its newest factory. We don’t have all…