Source: Bulletin of the Belgian Association of Photography in April 1932.
We read in the newspaper "The Metropolis" Antwerp: George Eastman, American tycoon Industry Photographic killed himself at the age of 77 years.
George Eastman was born in Waterville, NY in 1854. He was six when his father went to live in Rochester NY and would die soon. His mother was crippled. George, 14, left school. Insurance, where he found employment, paid at a rate of $ 3 per week. His two sisters completed the family. Haunted by the specter of poverty, the young Eastman saved his earnings as much as possible and the first year, the price of multiple deprivation, managed to save $ 37. The insurance company saw that she had in him a worker, and soon the $ 3 per week became $ 600 per year, the maximum possible. His manager then recommended him for an accountant in a savings, treatment of $ 1,000 per year.
But Eastman was not satisfied with his office work. His spare time, he used them to manipulate the tool to fix and had ended up installing a whole little workshop.
Then he learned to do photography. He paid $ 5 to a professional who put him aware of the preparation of the wet plate then in use. Then he tried to remedy the lack of practice the whole system. Unfortunately, his experiments were interrupted: he had just been designated for a higher position in the bank. In the meantime, he learned that England had been at the plate with gelatin-bromide. Concerned, without waiting for additional information, it starts to work. He experiments. The failures the tailgating instead of discouraged. And the great result he obtained was not the perfect plate, but he wanted the commercial viability of the process. Which was impossible with the wet plate was achieved with the dry plate: manufacture and sell in great detail.
Iconography: Nadar photograph Eastman in 1890.
And his resolution was taken, after some hesitation (maintenance of his mother, horror of poverty, he earned $ 1,400 annually, saving of course) he decided to become a manufacturer of plates. Humble beginnings: a room with low rent, used for structural work and himself to the chemical. The chance was for many in the excellence of its terms, Eastman confessed candidly.
Professor Eastman became his pupil and his client. He set out with his camera and his new plates. However, our manufacturer, which had joined with Henry Strong, who had abandoned his job, while almost breaking the bank. Were manufactured for $ 4,000 wafers per month but they do not retain. Moreover, the plates were devoid of sensitivity, a phenomenon that can not be explained.
Eastman disappeared. A few months later, he reappeared. He returned to England where he had just acquired the rights to operate an excellent formula. But the plate was not always what it should be: it was the quality of the gelatine which spoiled everything.
Then came the substitution of glass and celluloid creation of the apparatus for receiving the film. n was in 1884. The Kodak was launched the following year and the formula: "Press the buton, we'll do the rest."
It was this film that gave the idea and allowed Edison to achieve the "Kinetograph.
Then, in 1888, was founded "the Eastman Kodak Company," which acquired all rights to George Eastman.
We will not say this extension has taken this case, we know it: a room, it became a facility that covers twenty hectares at least.
Suffice it to say that Eastman leaving about one hundred million dollars and that his works of philanthropy totaled more than $ 75 million. A bachelor, he had built a theater in Rochester. London owes a dental clinic also like Rome, Paris, Brussels and Sockholm.
During the war, he subscribed to several million dollars in various loans allies. Moreover, many of its donations were made in the anonymity of Couvet.
recall, with regard Brussels, the city had given the ground. Eastman, meanwhile, gave one million dollars.
note: finding the article "The Metropolis" a little "light", I tried several things that I thought interesting to the reader. Kodak means nothing but lorsqu'Eastman launched on the market the first camera of its design, he sought a single word, "slamming" and pronounceable in any language.
As for the origin of the term, which is the original "You Press The Button, We Do The Rest", it comes from the Kodak camera phone in hand, carrying a roll of paper negative for 100 shots. These being carried out, it was assigned the complete device and the merchant receive, in addition to prints, her unit provided with a new film ready to be emulsified.
Regarding the suicide of Eastman it is caused by a disease of the spine that would have rendered permanently disabled. Unable to support this idea, he had to shoot in the heart to escape this fate. Was found near his body the following message: "My work is done. Why wait?".
