Thanks for stopping by! – Chris
Tag Japan
Happy SUNday! – Dolls from Yokohama and more.
When Carol and I lived in Yokohama in the late 1970s, a wonderful local artist made these dolls for us. We’ve kept them in a glass display cabinet all of these years and they remind us of how much we enjoyed our time there. Such artistry! Dolls photographed with my Samsung Galaxy S4 camera.
Morning glory on the garden shed – Yokohama 1978. The door was salvaged from the local Navy Lodge from their vast trove of bits and pieces in the maintenance office. This image is scanned from a picture I took with my Kodak EK4 instant camera on Kodak film. Kodaks brief foray into instant photography.
Unrelated to the dolls, here’s the garden shed that I built for Carol. The Housing Office on the Navy base that we lived on in the Naka ward in Yokohama had free wood that you could use for projects such as this and the fence you see to its right. The lumber was free and so was the paint – only one color was available so everything was painted the same color in the neighborhood!
Stacked sky high!
While on a walkabout on the backstreets in our neighborhood we discovered this “wall” of crates just outside of a bar. The image was taken with my Canon F-1 on Kodachrome film – 1978.
Thanks for stopping by and have a beautiful day! – Chris
Please respect that all content, including photos and text, are the property of this blog and its owner, Yashica Pentamatic Fanatic, Yashica Sailor Boy, Yashica Chris.
Copyright © 2015-2019 Yashica Pentamatic Fanatic, Chris Whelan
All rights reserved.
wordless wednesday
Thanks for stopping by! – Chris
Please respect that all content, including photos and text, are the property of this blog and its owner, Yashica Pentamatic Fanatic, Yashica Sailor Boy, Yashica Chris.
Copyright © 2015-2019 Yashica Pentamatic Fanatic, Chris Whelan
All rights reserved.
Yashica’s Tokyo Headquarters – 1974 and 2019
Yashica opened its new Tokyo headquarters officially in the Summer of 1974. Here’s a before and after picture.
Yashica’s headquarters as it appeared in August 1974.
Yashica headquarters building from April 2019. Photos courtesy of Paul Sokk.
The current building is known as the Kyocera Harajuku Building located at 6-27-8 Jingumae, Shibuya-ku, Tokyo
Kyocera acquired Yashica in 1983 and for the most part, Kyocera continues to operate in many of Yashica’s former properties.
For more about Yashica’s history please check out Paul’s excellent site here.
Thanks for stopping by! – Chris
Please respect that all content, including photos and text, are the property of this blog and its owner, Yashica Pentamatic Fanatic, Yashica Sailor Boy, Yashica Chris.
Copyright © 2015-2019 Yashica Pentamatic Fanatic, Chris Whelan
All rights reserved.
Yashica 1958 & Yashica 2019
The title is a bit misleading – well actually very misleading as Yashica (the original Japanese company) no longer exists. Yashica was acquired by Kyocera in 1983 and killed off by 2004. My good friend Paul Sokk and I have been on a quest to find some of Yashica’s old factory buildings and because Paul has a sharp eye for details, he was able to find Yashica’s factory in Shimosuwa (Nagano Prefecture) while conducting some research. The first image below is a scan from a sales brochure that I have from 1958.
Yashica’s main office building located on the factory campus in Shimosuwa, Nagano Prefecture, Japan in 1958.
The same building as seen this April (2019). The company that currently operates from the building (Mutoh) has no ties to either Yashica or Kyocera. Photo courtesy of Paul Sokk.
Notice in the current picture that the building has had an addition added to its near side (enclosing a previous carport) and received a rather mundane paint job especially compared to what I’m sure was a very colorful design originally.
By the way, the current occupant, Mutoh Industries, Ltd., makes large format printing machines. More can be found here.
Aerial view of the Yashica factory campus with the office building (viewed from behind) in the center.
The Yashica gym and auditorium as seen today. Look at the aerial view in the image above this one to see the gym as it appeared in the late 1950s. Photo courtesy of Paul Sokk.
Many thanks to Paul Sokk and his wife Kathy for sharing photos from their most recent trip to Japan. Paul is the creator of THE site for anything about Yashica TLRs and early Yashica history the site can be found at www.yashicatlr.com
Thanks for stopping by! – Chris
Please respect that all content, including photos and text, are the property of this blog and its owner, Yashica Pentamatic Fanatic, Yashica Sailor Boy, Yashica Chris.
Copyright © 2015-2019 Yashica Pentamatic Fanatic, Chris Whelan
All rights reserved.
Near Motomachi, Yokohama – 1979
Interesting street scene captured these young ladies interacting with the always helpful police. Taken near the prestigious Motomachi shopping street in central Yokohama. Canon F-1 with Canon FD 80-200mm lens on Kodachrome 64 film. It’s really hard to believe that this is now 40-years ago.
Thanks for stopping by! – Chris
Please respect that all content, including photos and text, are the property of this blog and its owner, Yashica Pentamatic Fanatic, Yashica Sailor Boy, Yashica Chris.
Copyright © 2015-2019 Yashica Pentamatic Fanatic, Chris Whelan
All rights reserved.
Yashica’s History as reported by Yashica – 1975
The Yashica marketing team that put this document together back in early 1975 appear to have summarized the history of the company – or were blatantly unaware of the actual dates of important milestones.
But with that said it’s important to “take it all in ” from all sources and to glean whatever good bits that it does offer. Yashica wasn’t a company that seemed to be all that interested in dates anyway. Some of the dates were more than likely dates that were recorded in Japan and may have marked the actual, formal date that the event was finalized. There’s also the possibility that if this brochure was put together in the US there may simply be some instances where meanings were lost in translation.
This excerpt is taken from the Yashica publication ‘Yashica A New Horizon’
It does use the term “highlights” when summarizing the events.
Yashica’s new (1974) headquarters building in Shibuya-ku, Tokyo.
Published in early 1975, this brochure was primarily focused on camera dealers located in the United States.
I’ll be sharing additional bits from this interesting brochure over the coming weeks. Previous posts can be found here and here.
Many thanks for stopping by! – Chris
Please respect that all content, including photos and text, are the property of this blog and its owner, Yashica Pentamatic Fanatic, Yashica Sailor Boy, Yashica Chris.
Copyright © 2015-2019 Yashica Pentamatic Fanatic, Chris Whelan
All rights reserved.
The Yashica Okaya Factory – New View 1974
As I’ve previously reported here, Yashica’s last factory before the Kyocera acquisition was this modern sprawling complex in the town of Okaya, Nagano Prefecture.
I’ve recently purchased documents that show what I believe the complex looked like in the summer of 1974.
This is the only detailed color photograph of the factory that I’ve seen. For my previous post about the factory and to see the original view from 1972 click here.
Another related post can be found at https://wordpress.com/post/yashicasailorboy.com/8052
Additionally here’s the text about the factory taken directly from the Yashica publication ‘A New Horizon’ that contained the color image of the factory pictured above.
The introduction page from the 14-page booklet ‘Yashica A New Horizon’.
Of interest, Kyocera still operates from this same location today. For the most part, it looks only slightly changed from 1972. Yashica was purchased by Kyocera in 1983 and was gone by the mid-2000s. A great company and a great name wiped out by Kyocera shortly after what would have been Yashica’s Golden Anniversary.
I’ll be posting more from this very interesting and informative booklet from Yashica soon.
Thanks for stopping by! – Chris
Please respect that all content, including photos and text, are the property of this blog and its owner, Yashica Pentamatic Fanatic, Yashica Sailor Boy, Yashica Chris.
Copyright © 2015-2019 Yashica Pentamatic Fanatic, Chris Whelan
All rights reserved.
Tuesday 2’s
Yashica’s first two TLRs – 1953 1954
Twenty years of Yashica development – 1950s 1970s
Studio Cameras: (Top) Samsung Galaxy S4 (Bottom) Sony DSC W-170
Thanks for stopping by! – Chris
BTW, my camera shop is always open at http://www.ccstudio2380.com – lots of specials!
Please respect that all content, including photos and text, are the property of this blog and its owner, Yashica Pentamatic Fanatic, Yashica Sailor Boy, Yashica Chris.
Copyright © 2015-2019 Yashica Pentamatic Fanatic, Chris Whelan
All rights reserved.
Sakura in Naka-ku – Yokohama’s little jewel
From the Spring of 1979 – one of the rare times I was home during the Sakura Season in Japan.
Sankei-en in Yokohama
Along Avenue D – Honmoku, Naka-ku, Yokohama
Beautiful Sankei-en (Gardens)
We were very fortunate to live just a short bicycle ride from Sankei-en and although I was seldom home during the Spring we would always find time to spend the day there.
Camera: Canon F-1 with Canon FD lenses on Kodak Kodachrome film.
Thanks for stopping by! – Chris
I’m running some nice specials in my shop at http://www.ccstudio2380.com and I’ll be adding some new cameras shortly!
Please respect that all content, including photos and text, are the property of this blog and its owner, Yashica Pentamatic Fanatic, Yashica Sailor Boy, Yashica Chris.
Copyright © 2015-2019 Yashica Pentamatic Fanatic, Chris Whelan
All rights reserved.
Chasing Classic Cameras with Chris 