First post, glad to find this site. I'm generally interested in photographic history, and have welcomed digital as a milestone breakthrough after spending all night inhaling fixer over thirty years ago. I believe my first photograph was made on a No. 2 Brownie box camera which I recall taking apart when I was five. My first 35mm was an Argus 21 Markfinder in the US Navy during Vietnam Era which was soaked with salt water from being caught topside during heavy seas on my Fleet Tug. I took that one apart too. Once a civilian, I found another Argus, a C-3 "brick" which someone else had taken apart. Once repaired, I took some of my first B&W images which I developed and printed, referring to those all-night pursuits of perfection, and being into computer technology, couldn't wait for digital to arrive. It took only another twenty years. Now I'm enjoying both worlds by using several models of ancient film cameras and developing the film, then scanning the results on my Epson Perfection V700. I enjoy the pure engineering excellence of my collection of Zeiss Ikon roll-film cameras, and my collection of Nikons and Leicas. The lesser-known quirks of Exactas, Voigtlanders, Rolleis, and Retinas are fun as well, and I once rebuilt several Compur shutters to get those 1/2 and 1 second slow speeds to work. Having studied the masters; Eisenstadt, Steichen, Stieglitz, Adams, Bourke-White, et al, I do have an appreciation of what to aspire to, and realize my limitations. So enough blah-blah, I'm posting a great tree on an obscure road several miles from home where my G-G Grandfather began his journey with the MN 7th. Vol. Infantry in 1862 during the U.S. - Dakota War. The small lake there was one of the first encampments, and it may have served as shade for them 155 years ago. I shot this with the first Kodak Retina model 017, a 1934 Nagel product, and it was at least ten years ago, but I was pleased with the final result.