In Memoriam: Joe Saltzer

I was reached by the news yesterday that Joseph Saltzer of SaltHill Photographic Products died back in 2008, of complications resulting from triple bypass surgery.

I wish I could write a proper obituary of Joe, whose death appears to have gone unmarked in the online world. I can't, I'm afraid. I reviewed a number of his innovative and deluxe high-end darkroom products for Camera & Darkroom magazine over a number of years, talked to him on the phone many times, and finally met him in person when I visited his beautiful contemporary/modern style house at the end of Wildcat Road in Chappaqua, New York, an hour outside New York City. In the words of Andy Grundberg, "SaltHill [was] what you might call a small manufacturing and marketing firm," which Joe ran from the lower floor of his home, where he also had a laboratory-quality, state-of-the-art research darkroom.

His chief designer was a genius from Eastern Europe who spoke little English. Together they conceived, designed, built and marketed products which were certainly overbuilt for their purposes, and which had the same relationship to more commonplace darkroom products that Leica has in the world of cameras today.

Joe was the one who recommended me to S. Tinsley Preston III for the job of chief editor of Darkroom Techniques magazine in 1994, a challenging, sometimes maddening job that was, overall, an experience that I would not have missed. For six years it was a wonderful lookout post from which to watch the changes then happening in photography, affording great views back at the past and toward what lay ahead.

Alas, fate had it in for Joe. His business faltered around various disasters and betrayals connected to his quixotic fiber-optic enlarger. I could tell the whole story, but the story is not mine to tell. The enlarger, which did eventually briefly come to market, had a superlight head made possible by its radical light source—a "cloth" consisting of a weave of fiberoptic strands, some emitting green light and some blue, the two colors of light to which variable contrast papers are sensitive. Joe's misfortunes multiplied upon themselves, and he lost his designer, his business, his fortune, his house...and his wife, who left him as his business crumbled. Joe and Tinsley Preston had a falling out over unpaid advertising bills, and Joe ended up working in the darkroom department at B&H Photo for a time, a relationship which unfortunately also did not end very well as far as I know. He moved house more than once, having come down considerably in the world, and I lost track of him during that time.

I knew Joe, and will remember him, as a bright light. He had vision, and talent, and taste. If he didn't leave a large mark on photography it's because he was in the wrong business at the wrong time, and paid too dearly for the boldness of his vision. His is one of the more tragic tales of the Transition Era. 1979 was the peak of the darkroom hobby in the U.S., and if Joe had started his business 15 or 20 years earlier, he would probably have been much better known and far more widely admired.

At the very least, his passing would have been more noticed by the world at large. I hope some photography museum somewhere (Eastman House, perhaps) will collect an example of each of his products so they don't disappear from history altogether. A belated goodbye, Joe.

Mike
(Thanks to Adrian F.)

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Comments

[Marcelo Guarini]

What a sad story. I always wanted to have one of his easels and one of his film washers, but I was never able to afford them at that time. His story is quite common, I had a friend who developed a clever and prosperous business related to import and distribution of car spare parts, but was swindled and betrayed repeated times to the point that he was unable to recover his company. His wife also left him because she couldn't tolerate not being rich. He finally died of cardiopulmonary complications, no doubt caused by his permanent state of depression. He was around 55.

[Rick Wilcox]

The truth of fixer not settleing to the bottom in print washing has shattered a myth that I had taken as gospel for over fifty five years. Photographers are not chemists or chemical engineers. We "mix" chemistry only according to instructions on prepackaged packets or formulas. But life is like that. Especially when you discover that what was always known to be so, isn't. This means I can just wash my film reels in the Nikor tanks under the faucet and just dump and change every couple of minutes and not worry. Apparently I didn't worry that much about it because that's the way I've always done it. But I felt guilty. Now I don't have to. Thanks.

[Steve Jacob]

Methinks you can largely always compensate for 1 sensor size difference using lenses and various other features, but there is still a difference.

The difference between MFT and APSC is about 0.7 stops in terms of SNR, seemingly more in DR terms (depending on sensor).

If trading down from FF, you are losing 1.9 stops to MFT instead of 1.2 to APSC.

If trading up from 1", you are gaining 1.7 stops to APSC instead of 1 stop to MFT.

Either way, MFT psychologically seems like an odd place to stop, considering price and size wise there is no real difference between them and most APSC mirrorless cams.

Would probably buy a Panasonic GH4 if I were into video though.

As for Sony, looks they have left their APSC customers dangling.

[Ned Bunnell]

Interesting article about Joe by Andy Grundberg from NYT in 1990...
http://www.nytimes.com/1990/06/10/style/pastimes-camera.html

[Christopher Lane]

Very, very heartfelt. Another great piece of writing. Thanks.

[Hélcio J. Tagliolatto]

I am shocked! Twice shocked, since I great admire Joe’s work and person, and because I’m a quadruple bypass surgery survivor.
Various SaltHill equipments grace my darkroom, thanks for your reviews, Mike, and they are, truly, “The Celebration of Craft”.
Thank you very much, Joe Saltzer.