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My decision is final: We will take the risk — Ernst Leitz II in June 1924

Or — Ich entscheide hiermit: Es wird riskiert

17 June 2024

Thus, legend says, Ernst Leitz II spoke at the meeting 100 years ago in June 1924. It was decided that Barnack’s 35mm camera would be produced by his employer, the firm of Ernst Leitz based in Wetzlar. This meeting was the stuff of legend, and no formal records of the exist today. Indeed, we do not know the exact day the meeting took place, but it was probably before the patent application for the camera was made on either 16 or 17 June 1924. Legend has it that the meeting ended at 12.30pm because it was lunchtime for Ernst Leitz, of which more anon.

Ernst Leitz II: The decision

This article is a brief chronological run through the events leading up to the June 1924 decision to produce the camera which eventually became known as the Leica. In 1911, a man called Oskar Barnack joined the firm of Ernst Leitz in Wetzlar from the renowned Zeiss optical firm. He was an engineer who had been employed to develop various mechanical engineering projects, but he soon found himself working on an experimental Leitz 35mm cine camera.

He found this to be a large and difficult instrument to carry and operate, particularly with his poor health. However, while he was working on that project, he produced the M875 film exposure tester, which has a familiar look to it.

Test device

This was not a prototype for the Leica, but rather it was a device to test the exposure rating of film before it was used with the cine camera. The next big step was with the Ur-Leica (as it is now called, in English it means “Original Leica”). This was the prototype for the 35mm camera with which we are all now familiar.

This camera, which emerged in 1914, had all metal construction and used 35mm film with an image size 24mmx36mm instead of the 18mmx24mm used in cine cameras. It had a shutter which was cocked as the camera was wound on, but which was not self-capping. The lens fitted to the camera was the 42mm Mikro Summar, designed for photography with microscopes, put into a special mount for normal distances.

Ernst Leitz II: War and peace

What happened during the next 10 years? Well, apart from the fact that the Great War (World War I) occurred, not much occurred for quite some time. Leitz and Barnack took the camera on their holidays and other travels, and Barnack took photos of his children.

But Barnack did create further prototypes for testing. Throughout his working life, he was an inveterate tester of his products, and he continued to test and improve his creations up to his death in 1936.

The 50mm lens

The next big step was a 50 mm lens with helicoid focus and an anastigmatic design, which was created by Max Berek around 1920. This optic appeared on the legendary 0 Series cameras, which were not actually sold. Instead, they were distributed as test cameras in 1923 to 22 trusted parties. The camera shown below was given, initially, to Henri Dumur, a senior Leitz manager who was related to the Leitz family. Eventually, it ended up with Barnack. It was engraved ‘Oscar Barnack’ possibly by his son, Conrad, who appears in the family photo above. This camera was sold for €14.4 million in 2022, a world record price for a camera.

Following all this testing, Barnack and his team decided to push for production status for the camera. Patent application papers were prepared. There are no recorded minutes with a date and time for the meeting at which the decision to produce the camera was taken. But we must assume that the meeting was held on or before the patent application date for the new shutter, which was now self-capping. The date seems to have been either 16 or 17 June 1924, based on British and German patents.

Ernst Leitz II decides

The following is based on the description in the book Oskar Barnack, “From the Idea to the Leica” by Ulf Richter. An English version of the book, translated by Rolf Fricke, is available from Leica Society International (LSI).

The legend has it that the meeting was held in the morning and lasted for over three hours. It is said to have taken place in the administration block for the Leitz Factory, in a room adjoining the office of Ernst Leitz II.

The assembled personnel were

Ernst Leitz II
Henri Dumur
Oskar Barnack
Max Berek
August Bauer, Mechanical Foreman
Rudolf Zak, Optical Foreman
Michael Becker Financial and Marketing

Another individual, one Alfred Turk, had earlier given consenting advice to Ernst Leitz II, but there is no evidence that he was at the meeting.

Ernst Leitz II: Decision dissent

According to a much later radio broadcast, for his 80^th Birthday in 1951, Ernst Leitz described Oskar Barnack as a very intelligent man who was constantly improving the devices which he had made. Leitz recorded that he had taken one of those devices to America and had used it to make pictures. He also, surprisingly, recorded the fact that most of those present were against going to full-scale production. One must assume that Barnack and Berek favoured producing what were their creations, so those against must have included most of those listed above.

Leitz recalled that it was around the middle of the day and that no agreement had been reached. He then observed that it was about 12.30 pm and that he concluded the meeting by saying, in first person, “Ich entscheide hiermit: Es wird riskiert.“ which means “I have decided, the risk will be taken”.

Another legend says that Leitz normally took his lunch about that time and would usually have gone up to the Villa Friedwart through a tunnel which connected with the administration block. The tunnel was damaged in WWII and was never reopened. I have been in the basement where it connected, but have never been in the tunnel itself. What I did get to see at Villa Friedwart was the Leitz family silver, which might have been used by Mr Leitz for his lunch.

Meeting place

So, what does the location of the decision-making meeting look like today?

The room in which the meeting took place is just another modern office these days, and all I have is this photo of fellow Macfilos writer Ed Schwartzreich staring into the room.

Much more interesting is the adjacent room, where Ernst Leitz had his office, has been preserved. The current occupier of the building told us that many years of tobacco smoke had to be cleaned off the wall to reveal the lovely woodwork.

The bottom photo below shows LSI members Ed Schwartzreich (left) and Jay Paxton (middle) entering the room, while the current occupier (right) describes the scene. The top left image shows the lovely wood panelling. There is a hatch opening into a secretary’s office and a curtained window leading to a small kitchen from which food could be served. This, of course, begs the question as to why Mr Leitz had to go home for his lunch.

That matter having been decided, it took some time to get the product to the market, with its first commercial launch being at the Leipzig Spring Fair in March 1925.

The first use of the term Leica (= LEItz + CAmera) was in this advertisement from May 1925. The rest is history, apart from a lot of very hard work by Barnack and his team and their successors.