The Decline of Kodak…What Happened

In December 1975, a 24-year-old engineer in a Rochester back lab took the world's first digital photograph — and his employer, Eastman Kodak, patented the invention and told him to keep it quiet. This is the story of the company that put a camera in every American hand, photographed the moon, and built an entire city on film — then buried the future it had invented to protect the past. From a one-dollar camera to a courtroom massacre against Polaroid, a five-billion-dollar detour into aspirin, and a fire sale where its rivals teamed up to buy its life's work, every fatal decision seemed reasonable at the time. Thirty-seven years after that first digital picture, Kodak walked into bankruptcy court with its stock worth less than a single print — and what survived may be the strangest part of the story. #kodak #history #documentary #kodakmoment #businesshistory