where there’s smoke there’s fire

Update: the pictures shown by Westlicht for the first known Nikon I camera had a serial number 60924 and not 60922 as mentioned in their description. No sure what is going, but I was told that #60924 is not a complete original and has repair parts (it should have internally 3 exact same numbers and it has only two numbers and they are not the same). The above picture actually shows the first known Nikon I camera with serial number 60922.

I usually cover the Westlicht camera auctions on LeicaRumors because they have a lot of interesting Leica gear, but this time they have a Nikon I rangefinder camera (No. 60924) from 1948 that is the earliest known surviving production Nikon in the world. The starting price is €90,000 (almost $100,000) and the selling estimate is for €160,000-180,000 (almost $200,000). Here is the description and a few more pictures:

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