"none" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 01 Jan 2005 22:33:38 -0800, Mad Mac
wrote:

c.reifert wrote:

Bell and Howell is the brand of parts systems that I repair in car
dealerships. Same logo, so I know it's the same group. That scares
me!!

Will

B&H were also in the military manufacturing business (Radar/Periscopes
etc.)!

Bell and Howell were into just about all types of manufacturing years
ago.
Especially the photographic industry.
Gunsight cameras, belly cameras etc...
Then there's all the actual general photgraphic cameras from still to
mopic.( in the 60's they marketed the most popular work horse 35mm
around under the pentax label. Spotmatic was it's name.)
Then of course there's all the WWII era cameras they made for th
military which were used right up to the late 70's.( their 16mm combat
movie cameras the KM, KLM, KRM 70 series. I used them during my combat
camera days.)
They also made slide strip projectors as well as movie film
projectors.
They started out as principally a grinder of optical lenses and grew
from there.

Sounds like a familiar story - a company makes a name for itself in one
area, then establishes a good distribution network. Then some wall street
gobbler buys it for it's distribution network and used it to sell cheap junk
and trinkets. Then they unload the shell of the company after they have
sucked all the value out of it and run off their senior tech staff.