evidenced by a record of one at the New York Public Library. By 1913, advertisements described the Commercial Camera Company as headquartered at Rochester and with a licensing and manufacturing relationship with Eastman Kodak. The pair filed another U.S. patent application in 1913 further developing their ideas. By 1920, distribution agency in various European markets was by the [[A Alfred Herbert (company)|Alfred Herbert companies]]. The Commercial Camera Company apparently became the Photostat Corporation around 1921, for "Commercial Camera Company" is described as a former name of Photostat Corporation in a 1922 issue of Patent and Trade Mark Review. For at least 40 years the brand was widespread enough that its name was genericized by the public. The Photostat Corporation was eventually absorbed by Itek in 1963. Description Both RetinalGraph and Photostat machines consisted of a large camera that photographed documents or papers and exposed an image directly onto rolls of sensitized photographic paper that were about long. A prism was placed in front of the lens to reverse the image. After a 10-second exposure, the paper was directed to developing and fixing baths, then either air- or machine-dried. Since the print was directly exposed, without the use of an intermediate film, the result was a negative print. A typical typewritten document would appear on the photostat print with a black background and white letters. Thanks to the prism, the text would remain legible. Producing photostats took about two minutes in total. The result could, in turn, be photostated again to make any number of positive prints. The photographic prints produced by such machines are commonly referred to as "photostats" or "photostatic copies." The verbs "photostat", "photostatted", and "photostatting" refer to making copies on such a machine in the same way that the trademarked name "Xerox" was later used to refer to any copy made by means of electrostatic photocopying. People who operated these machines were known as photostat operators. It was the expense and inconvenience of photostats that drove Chester Carlson to study electrophotography. In the mid-1940s Carlson sold the rights to his inventionwhich became known as xerographyto the Haloid Company and photostatting soon sank into history. See also List of duplicating processes Duplicating machines Cyclostyle (copier) References General references External links Glen Gable (2005), Heavy Metal Madness: Making Copies from Carbon to Kinkos, CreativePro David Owen (2005), "Copies in Seconds", Engineering and Science, 68 (3). pp. 24–31. ISSN 0013-7812