May 8th, 1924
Chattanooga Panorama
Chattanooga in 1924...
...begins to take a more contemporary shape. Autos are fully entrenched - displacing the horse & buggy forever. It would be another year before the city's first radio station, WDOD-AM, would sign on the air. And within 2 years, the original Read House Hotel seen here would be mostly demolished - replaced by the current version of the historic hotel.
In 1924, Garnet Carter was launching a new community on Lookout Mountain; to be known as Fairyland. From those efforts, miniature golf (Tom Thumb Golf) and Rock City would later take shape as one of the area’s destination attractions.
Another popular attraction was still 4 years away when Leo Lambert would discover a formerly hidden cave and waterfall. He would name the attraction after his wife, Ruby.
The Cirkut Camera
The Cirkut was a rotating panoramic camera - manufactured by Rochester Panoramic Camera Company starting in 1905. Manufacture of the camera continued through 1949.
The Cirkut camera changed the game by using a simple clockwork (like a wind-up toy) to rotate the camera at the same rate the film advanced, allowing for a longer, uninterrupted exposure. The largest Cirkut camera could shoot negatives that were 16 inches high and the 18 foot length of film could be cut to any size.
The length of film (corresponding to the width of the panorama), varied by model, ranging up to 18 feet (5.5m) for the No. 16, yielding a single negative with an area of more than 24 square feet (2.2 m2). Thus, the information content of Cirkut images can be in the gigapixel range.
Source: 'Vintage Panoramic Photos - Long and Lovely' - barkingsandsvintage. blogspot.com
