Harry Gross

Harry Gross (1918-1979) was a photographer, photo historian, camera collector & gallery owner. In the 1940s, he owned a lucrative seed, feed & insecticide business in Spokane, WA. The financial success of this business enabled him to amass one of the world’s best collections of daguerreotypes, wet plate cameras, antique photographic equipment & photography books. Drawing upon this collection, in 1964 Gross wrote the first book ever published about camera collecting, Antique and Classic Cameras. His collection is now the core of the camera collection at Japan’s Yokohama City Museum. In 1955, Gross moved to Eugene, Oregon & was employed as staff photographer for the City. Working in a position at the Eugene Water & Electric Board, Gross was active in photographing their large-scale hydroelectric construction projects. In the early 1960s, Gross attended classes held by Ansel Adams & it was likely this experience that marked a shift in his picture taking toward art photography. In 1966, he opened a gallery in Eugene just blocks from the university campus called Gross Gallery. Dedicated to contemporary photography, the gallery staged several significant exhibitions, including works by William Mortensen. Yet Gross primarily used the gallery to showcase his own work, a mix of landscapes, abstractions, nudes, political figures & photographs documenting the peace movement that so defined the late 1960s. Growing his hair long & fully immersing himself in the youth movement, Gross traveled the country with his Nikon SP documenting the scene, including a stop in San Francisco where he photographed the anti-war demonstrations & street life of the Haight-Ashbury district. In 1979, at the age of 61, Harry Gross took his own life after a prolonged & hopeless fight against cancer. 

The above description accompanied these photos on sale on Ebay. Also this is the above mentioned book also for sale on Ebay: