EMG archaeology explained in funny video!

[Starkton]

Very interesting reading of your posts. I like both the presented EMG gramophone and the vivid milieu studies on collectors and dealers in (and around) Great Britain.

[GMEMG]

Well, it's just MY experience and i suppose i have got off rather lightly - My friend "The Squire" when asking in an Oxford junkshop C 1970 for 78's was told to "F**K off" and my friend "Thorneedle" (the leading maker and expert on Fibre Needles)was physically escorted out of another shop when asking the same question

Those were the days when the UK junk trade REALLY was run by characters upon whom "Steptoe & Son" were based - the Late Great Brian Rust had very similar experiences - luckily not putting him off !

If my video's are a little individual then it's because i am so myself and do them not only to share what i have but to amuse myself. I have been through HELL in the last 6 years in my personal life and If i make anyone laugh, then it makes me laugh as well and i do need one sometimes !



I have been asked to point out that Frank James is an Author, Historian, Farmer and Cider maker and is NOT a Doctor and does NOT run any form of medical establishment and that any reference to "Frank James' Infirmary in my Video is just a slip of the tongue"

[Steve]

I don't really know any other collectors in the UK. I've met a couple of collectors and seen their collections briefly. Both were enthusiastic, friendly and welcoming. The only 'obnoxious' characters I've ever met have all been categorised as dealers rather than collectors. The UK gramophone trade appears to attract these losers, why I really couldn't say.

Sadly though the collector ethic here appears to imply that you will likely live like a hermit, be single and literally stock pile machines up that you've bought very cheaply with little regard for selection.

In contrast, a lot of the 'leading collectors' in the USA, Europe and the Far East appear to be more discriminating with a tidy display of machines that truly represent a 'collection' rather than a horde. Extensive knowledge of the items also seems to be an essential pre-requisite for purchase.

Just my boring 0.02

[syncopeter]

I cannot but agree with the last two posts. Even here in Holland I know of a collector who buys each and every HMV portable he can find and then stacks them in a damp cellar. Condition is not important, because it will be ruined within a year anyhow... Some other people I know really care about their machines. keep them as original as possible in good playing condition and really enjoy having and using them. They tend to play their precious records on modern gramophones but have a selection of double copies for their old machines. And yes, most collectors are single and at least middle age. I was an exception to that rule, but my focus was on music and not so much on machines. And I had a spare room where I could store my 3,000+ 78s. A friend of mine literally lives within his collection of 80+ machines and over 40,000 records. He never cooks, because that would mean an hours work of freeing up his kitchen to get to his gas stove... He had a huge leak some years ago so he had to clear his living room. It took him a week to relocate his stuff and two weeks to put it back again! Mind you, he can find any record within 2 minutes and knows by heart where he bought it and how much he payed for it. So there is method in his madness. I can't live like that, but he's quite happy, so who am I to blame him? The great late Roger Thorne was like that too. Eccentric as you could have him, but a very very sweet person. Climbing the stairs of his house in Caterham was an Alpine experience with all the records stacked there, not to mention the junk yard he called his garden. But he was a great man and is missed by everybody who knew him a little better. Thanks to him I was able to buy (and lose afterwards through the Dutch IRS) an incredible collection of piano solo records for next to nothing. What did he earn on it? A handful of quid at the most if anything at all. He just wanted the collection to end up in good hands. I lost it, but know that each and every record has found a good new home.

[Swing Band Heaven]

Well, it's just MY experience and i suppose i have got off rather lightly - My friend "The Squire" when asking in an Oxford junkshop C 1970 for 78's was told to "F**K off" and my friend "Thorneedle" (the leading maker and expert on Fibre Needles)was physically escorted out of another shop when asking the same question

Those were the days when the UK junk trade REALLY was run by characters upon whom "Steptoe & Son" were based -

I was trawling junk shops in the 1970s and yes they really were a world away from the "junk" shops you see today. You usually had to hunt them out as well as they were usually hidden away. Things stacked everywhere - and no marked prices! However - I never had an experience like you have described. They were only too happy to sell anything they could for any money. If anything they were usually just incredulous that anyone would part with money for such objects. If these are true stories then it is certainly not my experience at that time or indeed at any time since.

[Steve]

I was trawling junk shops in the 1970s

Really?

It never ceases to amaze me how many of us were apparently looking in junk shops in our formative years. I know you're younger than me so that makes you........very young indeed! Why were you trawling junk shops in the 1970's? I'm older than you but even I was out playing with friends on my push bike! I thought that was what young kids were supposed to do? Wasted youth indeed!

[Swing Band Heaven]

Very simple really. I hate shopping so when my parents went somewhere shopping I would split off and go to look for and at junk shops. Much better than looking at normal shops - although I was severly limited in my purchasing power being only 9 to 10 years old. I looked for old books and 78s - what else! I did pleny of the bike and building camps stuff with friends. The beauty of the 70s was that kids had so much freedom - as long as I said more or less where I was going I was free to roam - provided I checked in at lunchtime and again at 5.30ish. My children now have some of this freedom here in NZ.

[Steve]

I hate shopping so when my parents went somewhere shopping I would split off and go to look for and at junk shops. Much better than looking at normal shops - although I was severly limited in my purchasing power being only 9 to 10 years old.

Sorry for the interrogation but I find this most interesting! How many parents today would let their 9 year old children 'split off' let alone go look at 'junk shops'? Were you alone in this or were there other siblings to increase your bargaining power?

And I wonder what triggered your interest in old junk and 78's specifically when presumably your parents had little or no interest?

[GMEMG]

I also was wandering about he junkshops from the age of approx 8 - hence the fact that i can say "Over 30 years in the Antiques business" (Or before the Mast - as it were) and they WERE juk shops , there were few charity shops and NO "Antiques Centres"

I found local auctions fascinating but my then local saleroom - a large shed used by Canadian Soldiers during the Great War BANNED children under 12 !

The strange thing is that in those days we lived in a large town which had 2 junk shops and the Auction whilst the small town where i now live (and ¼ the size then ) had 7 junkshops

When we moved to the small town i had to cycle to my School (and the 2 junkshops) one of which had approx 20 horn gramophones in the celler - price - "Tin horn £3 - Wooden horn £5 " so i saved up and had to bring them home on the back of my bike as my parents severely disapproved of "Trade" and wouldn't help me ans my School banned the 'Bus to boys in School Uniform

When i now think of some of the "Characters" i met i shudder and certainly wouldn't let any children near some of them to - day !

[Steve]

Quite apart from todays dictat of political correctness, mollycoddling and health and safety, I find these stories of junk shop trawling at a tender age, quite surprising and equally baffling.