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Campbell Harper Recollections |
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Recollections |
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| 1. |
Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, England |
- £2 per week - Marion Boron |
| 2. |
Currie, Edinburgh |
- Dundas Streets - Honorary Graduates - Partnership Ended |
| 3. |
Edinburgh |
- 1960s |
| 4. |
Dorset, England |
- Leith Walk - Move to Dundas Street - Marion Boron - Amalgamation with Ferranti |
| 5. |
Edinburgh |
- Campbell Harper and Ferranti - George Robb - Muirhouse Mansion - 1980s - 2006 |
| 6. |
Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, England |
- Jack Galbraith - Joe Tavendale |
| 7. |
Carshalton, Surrey, England |
- Retail Shop |
| 8. |
Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, England |
- Cumberland Photography - Marion Boron - My Illness - EPS Trophy - Employment |
| 9. |
Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, England |
- Robert Muir |
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Recollections 1. Allan Dodds Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, England |
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Thank you to Allan Dodds, now Consultant Health/Neuropsychologist living in Nottingham, England, for his recollections of working for Campbell Harper in Edinburgh. Allan wrote: |
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£2.00 per Week "I worked for Campbell Harper Ltd for three years between 1960 and 1963. I was paid £2.00 for a five and a half day week in 1961, somewhat less in a year than the cost of a new Leica IIIG!" |
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Allan soon moved on to more lucrative employment, setting up the Photographic Dept at the PMR Hospital in Edinburgh from scratch, a couple of years later. Allan added: |
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Marion Boron "Marion Boron was my boss. He experimented with Finlaycolour and many other early additive processes. His career reached its pinnacle at Napier University. He was like a father to us in those days: letting us borrow the firm's equipment; allowing us to experiment with darkroom technique during the fallow winter months in the D&P trade (one film per day to process if we were unlucky!)." Alan Dodds, Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, England |
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Recollections 2. Martin Bone Currie, Edinburgh |
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Thank you to Martin Bone for his memories of Ronnie Inglis and the Campbell Harper business. Martin Bone's first job was working at an ad agency. This brought him into contact, for the first time, with Marion Boron who was then working at Campbell Harper. With encouragement from Marion Boron, Martin began to pursue photography. He started at Napier College around 1965 as a student. On the same day as Marion stated there as a lecturer. Martin describes Marion as "for my money, one of the best tutors anyone could wish for". Martin wrote: |
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Dundas Street "Ronnie Inglis and Les Stevens got together and took over the old Campbell Harper premises in the Dundas Street basement - 10a? All went fine and they built a superb studio with 4x5, 10x8 and Hasslblads and were the first to use 'fish fryers' the early Broncolour flash soft-lights we now take for granted. Ronnie's work was often in architectural journals. Les the more creative. Both were top rate technicians. There was also a lab technician, Charlie (from the Isles) who now runs J S Marr." Honorary Graduates "The two of them were responsible for the formal portraits taken of Principles and Honorary Graduates (Sean Connery, King Olaf and so on) for Heriot-Watt College for about ten years, long after I had left." Partnership Ended "Ronnie and Les built a solid business till in 1985 when Les suddenly developed heart failure as a result of a childhood illness, and despite being rushed by air ambulance to Cambridge he died a week following a heart transplant. The partnership was very close, but I lost touch with Ronnie not long after it ended. I only later head that he had gone to Brighton University to teach photography." Martin Bone, Currie, Edinburgh: December 21+23, 2005 |
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Recollections 3. Peter Stubbs Edinburgh |
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1960s Marion Boron was also a prominent member of Edinburgh Photographic Society, where he give Beginners' Tuition Classes and exhibited his prints. I recall some of his work that required an immense amount of patience, using multiple black and white negatives in registration to create colour prints - long before the days of digital imaging! Ann Harper, grand-daughter of J Campbell Harper and daughter of Alan Harper was also involved in the business. Ann was a member of Edinburgh Photographic Society. She is one of the photographers in the photos below of an EPS outing to Edinburgh Zoo in the mid-1960s:
J Campbell Harper also carried out all black and white developing and printing work for Campbell Harper Photographic Services until around 1965 when the service was discontinued because the company could no longer compete on costs with dedicated D&P labs. - Peter Stubbs |
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Recollections 4. Ian Nicol Dorset, England |
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Thank you to Ian Nicol for sending me his recollections of working for Campbell Harper from about 1959 onwards. Ian wrote: |
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Leith Walk "I joined J Campbell Harper Ltd, from Francis Inglis Ltd, perhaps a year or so before the move to Dundas Street. I was the last person to work from the old Leith Walk premises, most of the equipment having been spirited away over a weekend leaving only the D&P section functional." Move to Dundas Street "Within the following week, that too was transferred to the New Town premises, abandoning the Leith building and tens of thousands of old glass negatives, ancient obsolete cameras and other items to the not so tender mercies of the demolition crew." Marion Boron "Awaiting me in one of the Dundas Street basement darkrooms was a brand new Ilford semi-automatic en-printing machine around which the then manager, Marion Boron, bustled with his customary enthusiasm. As Allan Dodds has already indicated, when workflow allowed, Marion actively encouraged us all to experiment freely and submit our best efforts to the scrutiny of the EPS judges. He was quite simply one of the kindest and most generous people I have ever had the pleasure to work with." Amalgamation with Ferranti "Later, I left the company. I kept in touch with the people at Dundas Street until the amalgamation with Ferranti, although I had long realised that commercial/industrial photography was not for me. Subsequently, I moved to London and attended Hornsey Art College before running a graphic design partnership business for a number of years. I am now retired and living in the south of England on the Dorset coast." Ian Nicol, Dorset, England |
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Recollections 5. Eddie Prior Edinburgh |
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Thank you to Eddie Prior who wrote: |
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1970s Campbell Harper and Ferranti "J Campbell Harper, as the business was known up to 1970, operated from Dundas Street. It was run by Anne Harper, with Jimmy Brown as photographer, and Gordon Pruce. In late 1969, Ferranti made its Photographic Department redundant, based on a plan to amalgamate the Department with a commercial operation, in order to continue the service. So the Ferranti Photographic Department and J Campbell Harper Ltd joined forces to become Campbell Harper Studios Ltd." |
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George Robb "The manager of the Ferranti Photographic Department, George Robb, become Managing Director of the new Company, and Anne Harper Director and Company Secretary. From Ferranti came: - Photographers Robert Muir (formerly of J Campbell Harper) and John Jack - Darkroom Technician, Jimmy Main - Graphic Designer, Eddie Prior." |
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Muirhouse Mansion "The new business took over the Ferranti property at Muirhouse Mansion, but moved to 46 Albany Street in 1975, and become Robb Campbell Harper, setting up the first commercial Professional Colour Processing Lab in Edinburgh." |
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1980s "By 1980, Jimmy Brown, Robert Muir and John Jack had all died in service. Anne Campbell had moved on, and Eddie Prior had rejoined Ferranti. By the mid 80s, George Robb had sold the business on, but it soon closed, with Jimmy Main also moving back to Ferranti." |
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Eddie Prior, Edinburgh: 11 January 2006 |
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2006 Today, in 2006, Campbell Harper no longer operates, but Eddie Prior is still in business trading in Edinburgh as Priority Graphic Design. Many thanks to Eddie for providing the history of Campbell Harper in the 1970s and 1980s, as set out in the paragraphs above. |
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Recollections 6. Dr Allan Dodds Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, England |
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Thank you to Dr Allan Dodds who wrote again: |
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Jack Galbraith "Dave Pearson was assisted by Jack Galbraith at South Saint David Street. Jack Galbraith Jack was there for four or five years before he was tragically killed in a motorcycle accident at the age of 21. Had he not been, we both might have been killed as he was on his way to pick me up from my home for a test ride but never arrived. His death was devastating to all who knew him, and I honestly don't think I ever got over it. Jack's death was just one of three premature deaths at Campbell Harpers in just a few years of one another." Joe Tavendale "Joe Tavendale was an avuncular Optician who had a consulting room at the back of the shop at South Saint David Street. He must have been shrewd because he sold me an expensive pair of spectacles that I was later told were of no use or need to me as my sight then was perfect!" Dr Allan Dodds, Nottingham, Nottinghamshire: September 6, 2008 |
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Recollections 7. Rankin Weir Carshalton, Surrey, England |
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Thank you to Rankin Weir who wrote: |
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Retail Shop "I worked for Drummond Young in the darkroom and Campbell Harper in the retail shop. Dave Pearson was manager and Mike Nagel worked there at the time. I moved on to Wallace Heaton in London. then Dixons. Later, I changed career and joined the Home Office and spent most of the time issuing passports. I'm now living in Surrey and assisting my wife who is a writer." Rankin Weir, Carshalton, Surrey, England: message in EdinPhoto Guestbook, November 8, 2008 |
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Recollections 8. Allan Dodds Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, England |
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Thank you to Allan for sending a couple more emails, with more memories. Allan wrote: |
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Cumberland Photography "Whilst working for Campbell Harper, Jack Galbraith and I set up a business called 'Cumberland Photography'. It was located in a basement in Cumberland Street (such imagination!) and it consisted of a 'studio' and a 'darkroom'. The weekly rent was £1.00! These premises were also employed for romantic purposes as Jack and I were then living with our strict parents as we were still teenagers! We used to undertake wedding photography and I recall that Ian Nicol joined us. Because of our youthful naivety and total lack of business nous, we never really made any inroads into the scene and the whole thing fizzled out. Also, because Marion Boron was such a quietly formidable figure I don't think any of us really felt confident enough to go it alone. Looking back at it all now, had Campbell Harper known about this and really feared our competition we might all have been sacked for disloyalty to the firm. But then Marion Boron would have put in a good word for us with the Management and it would have been laughed off as the folly that it was!" |
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Marion Boron My Illness "How the memories return! Marion Boron had a most significant influence on me. Apart from his kindly encouragement and example, he looked after me when one year I fell seriously ill whilst working for Campbell Harper. I was hospitalised for a number of weeks and was signed off sick for three months. My recovery was not guaranteed but eventually took place. Every week, Marion visited me to deliver my square brown paper pay envelope (£2.10s) and he invariably brought with him back issues of photographic magazines, both from the UK and the USA for me to read whilst bed-bound." EPS Trophy "The high point of one of these visits, when I was really still too ill to receive visitors, was when I was awarded the President's Trophy from the Edinburgh Photographic Society in 1961. Marion came round to our house and proudly presented me with the silver medal, saying to my parents how much of a credit I should be to them. I hope that he felt that I had been a credit to him as well. That helped my recovery by motivating me to get back to work in spite of the fact that I was still weak." Employment "I'm sure that Marion had to plead with his employers to keep me on as I was contributing nothing to the company. Employment legislation in those days was non-existent and the workforce was not unionised. I'm also sure that Marion's glowing reference, readily provided at my request, persuaded the Board of the Princess Margaret Rose Hospital to employ me as Head of Department of Medical Photography, in spite of my having absolutely no formal qualifications or indeed experience in the subject and having to start the whole thing off from scratch, a daunting prospect for one so young." |
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Alan Dodds, Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, England: March 24, 2010 |
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Recollections 9. Allan Dodds Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, England |
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Allan Dodds added: |
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Robert Muir "I have to add that Robert Muir was a most gifted and talented photographer, and no mean artist either. He was responsible for much of the commercial photography, mostly shot on an MPP Mk VII camera, but also on ancient half-plate cameras which were still in use in the 1960s. Darkroom "Robert produced some awesome quality bromide prints, and he set the standard for me when, years later, I faced the daunting task of setting up a department of medical photography. One memory I would rather not have is when I opened the darkroom door where he was working, to retrieve a shared thermometer, only to find Robert developing some 5x4 negatives of speed trials of a boat off Burntisland!" Needless to say in hindsight, Robert should have locked the darkroom door, and I should have knocked before opening it. But the result was a disaster. All the negatives were badly fogged and I was held as a pariah. Marion Boron and Robert together saved the day, and with laborious 'dodging', the fogging was overcome at the printing stage and passable prints were produced." Early Death "Robert suffered from a stomach ulcer which caused him perpetual pain, and it eventually became cancerous. He died at the early age of 35, another tragedy for Campbell Harper and an immeasurable loss to the visual arts, as I believe that Robert might well have gone on to do greater things." Alan Dodds, Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, England: December 21, 2010 |
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Acknowledgements |
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Many thanks to the following for giving me details of the work of Campbell Harper Ltd: - Marion Boron who concentrated on portraiture. He worked for the company both before and after it moved from Leith Walk to Dundas Street. He ran photographic evening classes for Edinburgh Education Department. He also gave classes in photography at Edinburgh Photographic Society and went on to lecture in Photography at Napier College (now Napier University). - Martin Bone whose first job, working at an ad agency, brought him into contact with Marion Boron at Campbell Harper. - Ann Campbell, one-time member of Edinburgh Photographic Society and a member of the Campbell Harper family. - Allan Dodds who worked for the company from 1960 to 1963. for providing further details about the company. - Ann Harper, who shared the darkrooms in the basement of Campbell Harper's at Dundas Street premises with Ian Nicol and Allan Dodds. - Robert Muir who concentrated on industrial and landscape photography. - Mike Nagel, who worked for the Campbell Harper Group, 1963-1968. He provided extensive notes of his recollections of the business. Most of the information above is taken from the notes provided by Mike Nagel. - Eddie Prior, who was employed as a graphic artist and latterly, Director, Technical Services at Campbell Harper Studios. - Ron Saunders, grandson to the Campbell Harper worker, John Bremner. - Rankin Weir, who worked for Drummond Young in the darkroom then Campbell Harper in the retail shop. |
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Campbell Harper More Pages |
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Campbell Harper Group - Company structure J Campbell Harper Ltd - History |
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