Date Introduced: - ; Years Manufactured: c. 1887 - c.1890
Construction: front focus via rack and pinion (two gear tracks on top of base rails); single swing; reversing by removable back; three-piece lens board
Materials: mahogany wood body; cherry base; black fabric bellows; brass hardware
Sizes Offered: 5x7; 5x8; 6 ½x8 ½; 8x10
Notes:

     The Boston Camera Company, 36 India St., Boston, Mass. was founded in 1884 by Samuel Turner.  It is known more for its Boston Camera Co. Hawkeye Detective Camera, which it started to manufacture in 1888, than its view cameras.  That they made view cameras is proved by the metal label on this camera, which is referred to in these pages as the Boston Camera Co. View Camera.  According to HistoricCamera.com, the Boston Reversible Back View Camera was introduced in 1887.

     According to Anthony, The Man, The Company, The Cameras, William P. Marder, et al, 1982, p. 276, the Boston Camera Co. was bought out by the Blair Camera Co. in 1890.  Blair manufactured a view camera starting in ~1890, called the Blair Reversible Back View Camera Improved Variation 4, that is almost identical to the Boston Reversible Back View.  An example of the Blair Reversible Back View Variation 4 has a rear standard that tapers to a smaller top that its bottom, as do a number of other Blair view cameras.  It also has a large lever on the top of the rear standard that frees the removable and reversible back when pressed, as do a number of other Blair products.  In contrast, the Boston Camera Co. Reversible Back View Camera rear standard, with its parallel edges, does not taper, and it has two small spring clips instead of one large clip to free its removable back.  In the usual way that camera manufactures in the 1880's and 1890's tend to re-use catalog engravings, even years after the design has changed, note that the engraving below shows the a purported Blair Camera Co. camera, but its non-tapering rear standard and two release clips for its back clear match the cameras above - the labeled Boston Camera Co. examples of their Reversible Back View.

References:  
The International Annual of Anthony's Photographic Bulletin, Vol. II, 1889, E. & H.T. Anthony & Co., 1889, ads p. 12 (Boston Camera Company only)
ad reprint in Anthony, The Man, The Company, The Cameras, William P. Marder, et al, 1982, p. 276

Illustrated Catalogue and Price List of Photographic Apparatus and Supplies, Blair Camera Co., 1895, pp. 3-5

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