Campbell Harper Limited

Leith Walk Premises

Thank you to Ron Saunders, Penn, Buckinghamshire, England, for telling me of his grandfather, John Bremner (1887-1945), who worked as a photographer for J Campbell Harper of Leith Walk for most of his working life.

John Bremner as a Young Man

© Reproduced with acknowledgement to Ron Saunders

John has asked if anybody has any information on his grandfather, Ron Saunders or on other early Campbell Harper employees. If you can help, please e-mail me so that I can pass on details to Ron.

Thank you.

Recollections

Allan Dodds

Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, England

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:

£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!"

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:

Marion Boron

"Marion Boran 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, England

Recollections

Martin Bone

Currie, Edinburgh

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 Boran, 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:

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

Recollections

Peter Stubbs

Edinburgh

1960s

Marion Boran 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

Recollections

Ian Nicol

Dorset, England

Thank you to Ian Nicol for sending me his recollections of working for Campbell Harper from about 1959 onwards.

Ian wrote:

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 Ferrati

"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

Recollections

Eddie Prior

Edinburgh

Thank you to Eddie Prior who wrote:

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."

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.

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."

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."

Eddie Prior, Edinburgh: 11 January 2006

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.

Recollections

Dr Allan Dodds

Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, England

Thank you to Dr Allan Dodds who wrote again:

Jack Galbraith

"Dave Pearson was assisted by Jack Galbraith at South Saint David Street. 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: September 6, 2008

Recollections

Rankin Weir

Carshalton, Surrey, England

Thank you to Rankin Weir who wrote:

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

Acknowledgements

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.