HIT Camera
While not the first of its type, the Hit camera name nonetheless became synonymous with this small (literally) body of cameras. Hit-Type cameras, as they are commonly referred to, first appeared on the Japanese market as early as the late 1930s. Those first camera models were the Midget and Mycro cameras. These tiny cameras used 17.5mm roll film (it looks like a itsy bitsy 127 roll) to make ten 14x14mm exposures. As an aside, there was an English Midget camera made by the Coronet company at about the same time using their own proprietary rolls of film and making 12x17mm frames.
The first Hit camera was produced by the Tougodo company in the mid 1940s and exports started arriving in the U.S. as early as 1946. The Hit cameras enjoyed a fairly brief but surprisingly large splash of popularity. While they did function and could make pictures if one desired to do so, mostly they were bought as toys, novelties or Christmas Tree decorations.
In terms of function, there is not too much to speak of. They have a fixed focus lens, single aperture and single shutter speed. They are also not the most robust camera and parts are easily bent or broken. Oftentimes the back doors latch so insecurely that film fogging is a common issue.
Despite being a relative flash-in-the-pan, we see these Hit-Type cameras show up fairly regularly, often with film still loaded in them and with shutters still firing away. It's not even all that rare to find them still in box with still-sealed, unexposed rolls of film.
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