Do you still have your first phonograph?

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FloridaClay
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Re: Do you still have your first phonograph?

Post by FloridaClay »

Various modern machines acquired new just for entertainment over earlier years are mostly long ago gone and forgotten. I do recall one rather nice green and white Zenith portable with the "cobra" tone arm and electrostatic tweeters bought in the late 50s or so that I wish I still had.

I am another one of those latecomers to the antique phonograph hobby, having started around age 64 when I retired. That was 10 years ago (where did that time go?). Once retired, I had the time to search and to learn. (And yes that does now make me older than dirt.)

The first antique machine I bought, which I still have, was an oak Amberola 50 I bought at an antique shop in East Tennessee while visiting family there. It both gave me the collecting bug and taught me that I needed to learn a lot more so I could make better purchase judgments in the future. The 50 ran, but turned out to be missing one of its two springs and the crank kept breaking. As to the later, with the help of George Vollema, I eventually learned that was because the crank was in a strain because some required spacers that fit between the bedplate and its mounts were missing, causing misalignment.

Once I've acquired a machine and brought it back to life, it is really hard to give it up. I have to get better about that, though, as I am now at the place that to upgrade my collection by getting better quality machines, I would have to get rid of something of lesser quality to make room for the new acquisition. Even my favorite Ord-Hume rule about space for collections fails at some point.

Clay
Last edited by FloridaClay on Fri Feb 13, 2015 1:21 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Arthur W. J. G. Ord-Hume's Laws of Collecting
1. Space will expand to accommodate an infinite number of possessions, regardless of their size.
2. Shortage of finance, however dire, will never prevent the acquisition of a desired object, however improbable its cost.

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Springmotor70
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Re: Do you still have your first phonograph?

Post by Springmotor70 »

I found an ad for a Brunswick "Victrola" for sale in the Thrifty Nickel in the summer of 1982. I was not yet 12 and asked my Dad if you could go look at it. It was a Brunswick Raleigh Console from 1924 or 25. We saw it and then a short time later called back, made an offer and bought it. We beat out a couple who looked at it wanting to turn it into a bar. I even still have the receipt the seller wrote for us and the Polaroids I took ;) ("take a picture it will last longer!") to take with me to show friends and my mom at her office when we went to a St. Louis Cardinals game that night. Later that year I started finding records and the Cardinals won the World Series 8-)

The woman we bought it from found it beat up and she refinished it (a fair job) but the original grill was stolen while it was being refinished. Her friend made a simpler but very well made walnut replacement. The seller also replaced a spring and really did not want to see it turned into a bar after all of her work. She showed us a picture of what it looked like "before" and took a picture of me with the machine on the day we carried it out. Years later I would find a couple of correct replacements for the grill as well as the correct albums, etc.

So yes today, more than 30 years later I still have that phonograh and even with a collection of "better" or more desirable machines it still sounds great and I could not part with it. :D If you take a look it even shows up on Youtube once in awhile. ;)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qky90CYICRA
"I think he was vaccinated with a phonograph needle"
My Old Boss 1923 - 2010

Kevan
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Re: Do you still have your first phonograph?

Post by Kevan »

Yes I still have mine. It is an Amberola 30 that my mother gave me. She knew out of her three children I could fix it and I did, with help from a forum like this. Since then I have 29 phonographs sold 3 and I'm about to buy another one. Thanks Mom. :roll:

Kevan

52089
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Re: Do you still have your first phonograph?

Post by 52089 »

Yes, I bought an Edison long case Model A Home from Dennis Valente in 1976 and walked it back home, balancing it on the crossbar of my bicycle! I still have it and it still runs quite well nearly 40 years later.

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TinfoilPhono
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Re: Do you still have your first phonograph?

Post by TinfoilPhono »

I wish I still had mine.... It was a humble Victrola IX I bought for $5 in 1961. I played that to death. I'd love to find that exact same machine again.

Number two was a Graphophone BKT. I don't have that one anymore either.

Number three, however, was a Graphophone AB ($20 with 4 Concert cylinders) which I do still have, and will never sell. My daughter can decide whether to keep it or sell it when I'm gone. ;)

Image

Image

Victrolacollector
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Re: Do you still have your first phonograph?

Post by Victrolacollector »

Sure do. My Magnola Talking Machine, my dad bought it in 1987, when I was 13 from an Antique Mall in Valparaiso, Indiana (that mall is since gone and now stands a Buffalo Wings Three). My grandfather came over and cranked it up. It is sentimental to me, I am now 41, my dad has since passed, and so has my grandfather. This machine got me started in the hobby.

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FloridaClay
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Re: Do you still have your first phonograph?

Post by FloridaClay »

TinfoilPhono wrote:Number three, however, was a Graphophone AB ($20 with 4 Concert cylinders) which I do still have, and will never sell. My daughter can decide whether to keep it or sell it when I'm gone. ;)
The AB looks like a really nice example. I recently bought some back issues of The Sound Box and had just finished reading George's article on them in the March 2006 issue.

Clay
Arthur W. J. G. Ord-Hume's Laws of Collecting
1. Space will expand to accommodate an infinite number of possessions, regardless of their size.
2. Shortage of finance, however dire, will never prevent the acquisition of a desired object, however improbable its cost.

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alang
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Re: Do you still have your first phonograph?

Post by alang »

Yes, I still have my first machine, an Edison Diamond Disc BC-34. But I only got that in 2009 when my wife brought "a gramophone" home from a furniture auction. Like others said, you get quite attached to a machine when you bring it back from the brink and put a lot of work into it. Now, when space in the house and acceptance of new machines by my wife are at an all time low I would certainly part with it. But who wants a BC-34? :lol:

Andreas

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pughphonos
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Re: Do you still have your first phonograph?

Post by pughphonos »

Do I have my first phonograph? NO. I grew up with a Victor Model X in the family basement; I played it constantly. It was given to my Dad in the late 1960s by its original owner--who remembered that he had admired it when he was a boy back in the 1920s. I eventually inherited it from my folks. But after a few years I gave it to a granddaughter of the original owner; sentiment did not trump the limited range of the model X horn.

Ralph
"You must serve music, because music is so enormous and can envelop you into such a state of perpetual anxiety and torture--but it is our first and main duty"
-- Maria Callas, 1968 interview.

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Re: Do you still have your first phonograph?

Post by Dave D »

52089 wrote:Yes, I bought an Edison long case Model A Home from Dennis Valente in 1976 and walked it back home, balancing it on the crossbar of my bicycle! I still have it and it still runs quite well nearly 40 years later.

I brought mine home in 1975 riding about 6 miles on the Schwinn Typhoon that I used to deliver newspapers. It sat in the basket in the front.

The antique dealer wanted $75 for it. I was making $10 per week delivering papers and I had saved up $73.50 and tried to buy it for that much. The guy would not budge one cent! I had to wait for the next week's profit to get the machine.

Looking back, I think I overpaid for a machine with no horn or reproducer and with a frozen mandrel shaft bearing. It was the first one I had ever seen though outside of the local museum and I thought they were rare!
Dave

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