page_title: Kodak
section_title: 1900–99
hierarchical_section_title: Kodak / History / Timeline / 1900–99
caption_attribution_description: English: Kodak Brownie camera
context_page_description: The Eastman Kodak Company is an American public company that produces various products related to its historic basis in analogue photography. The company is headquartered in Rochester, New York, and is incorporated in New Jersey. Kodak provides packaging, functional printing, graphic communications and professional services for businesses around the world. Its main business segments are Print Systems, Enterprise Inkjet Systems, Micro 3D Printing and Packaging, Software and Solutions, and Consumer and Film. It is best known for photographic film products.
  Kodak was founded by George Eastman and Henry A. Strong on September 4, 1888. During most of the 20th century, Kodak held a dominant position in photographic film. The company's ubiquity was such that its "Kodak moment" tagline entered the common lexicon to describe a personal event that deserved to be recorded for posterity. Kodak began to struggle financially in the late 1990s, as a result of the decline in sales of photographic film and its slowness in moving to digital photography, despite developing the first self-contained digital camera.
context_section_description: 1900: The Brownie camera was introduced, creating a new mass market for photography.
  1901: The present company, Eastman Kodak Company of New Jersey, was formed under the laws of that state. Eventually, the business in Jamestown was moved in its entirety to Rochester, and the plants in Jamestown were demolished.
  1908: Kodak acquires the exclusive right to supply film stock for the MPPC cartel. A similar attempt to secure an arrangement with European producers at the Paris Film Congress the following year falls through when French courts rule it illegal.
  By 1920: An "Autographic Feature" provided a means for recording data on the margin of the negative at the time of exposure. This feature was supplied on all Kodak cameras with the exception of a box camera designed for making panoramic pictures and was discontinued in 1932.
  1920: Tennessee Eastman was founded as a wholly owned subsidiary. The company's primary purpose was the manufacture of chemicals, such as acetyls, needed for Kodak's film photography products.
  1930: Eastman Kodak Company was added to the Dow Jones Industrial Average index on July 18, 1930. The company remained listed as one of the DJIA companies for the next 74 years, ending in 2004.
  1932: George Eastman dies at age 77 on March 14, 1932, taking his own life with a gunshot. The suicide note he leaves behind reads, "To my friends: My work is done. Why wait?"
  1935: Kodak introduced Kodachrome, a color reversal stock for movie and slide film.
  1936: Kodak branches out into manufacture of hand-grenades.
  1940–1944: Eastman Kodak ranked 62nd among United States corporations in the value of World War II military production contracts.
  1934–1956: Kodak introduces the Retina Series 35mm Camera 
  1958: Kodak releases an adhesive called Eastman #910. To the public, it is known as Super Glue.
  1959: Kodak introduced the Starmatic camera, the first automatic Brownie camera, which sold 10 million units over the next five years.
  1963: Kodak introduced the Instamatic camera, an inexpensive, easy-to-load, point-and-shoot camera.
  1970: Kodak scientists disclose the continuous wave tunable dye laser. This becomes a product for several high-tech companies but not at Kodak.
  1975: Steven Sasson, then an electrical engineer at Kodak, invented a digital camera.
  1976: The Bayer Pattern color filter array (CFA) was invented by Eastman Kodak researcher Bryce Bayer. The order in which dyes are placed on an image sensor photosite is still in use today. The basic technology is still the most commonly used of its kind to date.
  1976: Kodak introduced the first Kodamatic, instant picture cameras, using a similar film and technology to that of the Polaroid company.
  1976: The company sold 90% of the photographic film in the US along with 85% of the cameras.
  1978: Kodak introduces the Ektachem clinical chemistry testing system. The system employs dry film technology, and within 5 years was being used by most hospitals in the country.
  1981: Kodak was sued by Polaroid for infringement of its Instant Picture patents. The suit ran for five years, the court finally finding in favour of Polaroid in 1986.
  1982: Kodak launched the Kodak Disc film format for consumer cameras. The format ultimately proved unpopular and was later discontinued.
  1986: Kodak scientists created the world's first megapixel sensor, capable of recording 1.4 million pixels and producing a photo-quality 12.5 cm × 17.5 cm (4.9 in × 6.9 in) print.
  1987: Ching W. Tang, a senior research associate, and his colleague, Steven Van Slyke, developed the first multi-layer OLEDs at the Kodak Research Laboratories, for which he later became a Fellow of the Society for Information Display (SID)
  1988: Kodak buys Sterling Drug for $5.1 Billion
  1988: Kodak scientists introduce the coumarin tetramethyl laser dyes also used in OLED devices. These become a successful product until the line of fine chemicals is sold.
  1991: The Kodak Professional Digital Camera System or DCS, the first commercially available digital single-lens reflex (DSLR) camera. A customized camera back bearing the digital image
caption: A Brownie No 2. camera
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