The German company, which was already notable and would later create landmarks such as the Praktica, became a major international brand, employing 600 workers at the business’ peak.

In late 1945, 22-year-old U.S.-born Noble was arrested together with his father by Soviet occupation forces in Dresden and incarcerated at the NKVD special camp Nr.

The arrest came about after a newly appointed local Soviet commissar decided to appropriate the Noble family's Practica brand Kamera-Werkstaetten Guthe & Thorsch factory and its stocks of cameras.

[1] Unlike his father Charles A. Noble, who was released in 1952, John was sentenced to a further 15 years in 1950, and was transferred to the Soviet Gulag system when Special Prison Number 2 was closed in early 1950.

Doing a variety of menial jobs during his imprisonment, the highest being a uniformed lavatory attendant for the staff, he took part in the Vorkuta uprising of July 1953 as a prominent leader.