This camera came from the estate of an older gentleman who has been shopping at the camera shop for many years. He had amassed a pretty nice collection of cameras over the years. Apparently, this one must not have been one of his favorites, because I found it in the garage covered in dust and dirt. If you look closely at the above photos, you can see cobwebs and insect eggs on the viewfinder. I had never seen one before and I honestly didn't know what it was. I saw the Graflex badge and realized that I might have something special here. I was right, because it is considered as one of the rarest Graflex ever. There weren't a lot of them produced in the first place and there are even less surviving examples today. The Naturalist Graflex is similar to RB Graflex cameras, but this one was designed to accept lenses with focal lenghts up to 26" or 650mm. A true single lens reflex, this camera has a film plane shutter with speeds up to 1/1000th of a second! The adjustable viewfinder let the photographer stand above or behind in while shooting. I doubt I'll ever see another one again. This one sold to a gentleman in Australia. Hopefully it's a prize in his collection.
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