Since the first Leica was created in 1913 by Oskar Barnack, its small size, mechanical precision, and marvelous optics immediately made it the preferred camera of choice for professional photographers as well as demanding amateurs. Almost no event of the twentieth century, no matter how large or small, escaped the lens of a Leica. And the same is true today.

This book relates the epic story of the invention and the nearly one-hundred-year development of the Leica. In so doing, it matches for the first time the emotional charge of two hundred famous images—and the stories of the more than forty photographers who took them— to the historical evolution of this astonishing photographic instrument. Here we encounter the work and lives of the greats, among them Paul Wolff, Andre Kertesz, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Gisele Freund, Robert Capa, and Elliott Erwitt. All fourteen Leica models are presented in double-page color images, with the relevant historical explanations and technical data. Also detailed are foreign efforts to copy the Leica's genius

From the image of the flood in the city of Wetzlar in 1920 (perhaps the first work of photojournalism) to images of today, the Leica has been a witness to the history taking place before our eyes. Almost one hundred years after its creation, it has lost none of its power to amaze, astonish, and move us.