 | This article needs additional citations for verification .(May 2020) |
 Argus Building | |
| Industry | Cameras |
|---|---|
| Founded | 1936 |
| Defunct | 1969 |
| Headquarters | Ann Arbor, Michigan, U.S. |
Argus was an American maker of cameras and photographic products, founded in 1936 in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Argus originated as a subsidiary of the International Radio Corporation (IRC), founded by Charles Verschoor.
The International Radio Corporation was founded in 1931 by local businessman William E. Brown Jr., George J. Burke (who was a judge at the Nuremberg trials), [1] and Charles Albert Vershoor. [2] IRC started out selling a line of radios, developed by Verschoor, that had a body made out of molded plastic instead of wood. The Model A, the company's first camera, was introduced in May 1936. [2]
In August 1942, the company stopped all domestic production and focused on producing military optics and radio equipment for the armed forces during World War II. [2]
The company changed its name to Argus, Inc. in 1944. Argus introduced the Argus A Model in 1947, a metal-bodied camera and the company’s first model with an automatic shutter cocking to prevent double exposure and a hot shoe for flash. [3]
Its best-known product was the C3 rangefinder camera, which enjoyed a 27-year production run and became one of the top-selling cameras in history. The company's Model A was the first low-cost 35 mm camera in the United States.
In 1956, the Argus 50mm f/2.8 Cintagon lens, designed for the C44 camera, was one of the first commercial lenses designed with the aid of a computer. [3]
In 1957, Sylvania Electric Products acquired the company but continued to operate as Argus. In 1962, Sylvania sold the company to Mansfield Industries, an importer of photography products. [3] By 1969 it had ceased camera production (some rebadged cameras continued to be sold under the Argus name through the 1970s).[ citation needed ]
More recently, the Argus brand has been reestablished, and is used on a variety of inexpensive digital cameras made by Argus Camera Company, LLC., located in Inverness, Illinois.
Argus had two cameras for children developed in partnership with TEAMS Design. The cameras, the Bean and Sprout, won a Bronze 2009 IDEA award [4] from Bloomberg BusinessWeek and the Industrial Designers Society of America in addition to an Appliance Design 2009 EID award. [5]
John Alton, born Johann Jacob Altmann, in Sopron, Kingdom of Hungary, was an American cinematographer of Hungarian-German origin. Alton photographed some of the most famous films noir of the classic period and won an Academy Award for the cinematography of An American in Paris (1951), becoming the first Hungarian-born person to do so in the cinematography category.
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The International Radio Corporation (IRC) was an American radio receiver manufacturing company based in Ann Arbor, Michigan. It was established in 1931 by Charles Albert Verschoor with financial backing from Ann Arbor mayor William E. Brown, Jr., and a group of local business leaders. IRC manufactured numerous different radios, many bearing the Kadette name, including the first mass-produced AC/DC radio, the first pocket radio, and the first clock radio. Due to the seasonal nature of radio sales, the company attempted to diversify its offerings with a product that would sell well during the summer, eventually settling on a camera that would become the Argus. In 1939, IRC sold its radio-manufacturing business to its former General Sales Manager, W. Keene Jackson, although his new Kadette Radio Corporation only survived for a year before it went defunct. After World War II, International Industries and its International Research division became wholly owned subsidiaries of Argus, Inc., after which point the International name ceased to exist.
Sam Nelson (1896–1963) was an American film director who worked from the end of the silent era through the early 1960s. While most of his film work was in the assistant director role, he did direct over twenty films during the 1930s and 1940s, all of which were Westerns. As an assistant director, he worked on such productions as Pennies from Heaven, And Then There Were None, All the King's Men, the original 3:10 to Yuma, Some Like It Hot, A Raisin in the Sun, and Spartacus. In addition, he appeared in over a dozen films in small acting roles.
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