A green Columbia 211A, reupholstered?

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nostalgia
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A green Columbia 211A, reupholstered?

Post by nostalgia »

This portable is for sale in my area. We can see it is a Columbia 211A, but as we know it was not made in this color, and not with this type of fabric.
Has someone gone to extremes to reupholster it, a task that is for sure not an easy task, or what do you think this is?
The Columbia trademark is not existent, instead we can see a logo inside the lid, that I am not able to identify myself...
We have earlier seen Odeon portables manufactured with HMV motors but I myself have no clue what this is...
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Oedipus
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Re: A green Columbia 211A, reupholstered?

Post by Oedipus »

This is a 1954 211A, and as you can read on page 216 of His Master's Gramophone, post-war 211s were made in black, blue and green. I cannot, from your photos, see anything wrong with the leathercloth covering. The brown felt on the turntable is perhaps unexpected, but by this time, after the restrictions of the war, HMV were not as particular as they would once have been; if they were out of green felt with no prospect of a delivery in the immediate future, they would have used brown.

The Odeon name was used in some markets, and there is an Odeon 9102, which is the same as a Columbia 204/HMV 97. Odd that they did not bother to give this one a specific model number; the serial number is confirmed by the production figures, which list this as a Columbia!

Always bear in mind that the company exported to many countries, and that ex[port models often differed in detail from those on the home market. His Master's Gramophone covers only the models sold in Great Britain.

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nostalgia
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Re: A green Columbia 211A, reupholstered?

Post by nostalgia »

Thank you Oedipus, I had actually overseen the small note on page 216 in the HMH book telling this model also was made in green and blue, in addition to black.
Have you seen green or blue Columbia 211 machines before yourself? If they are hard to find, I maybe should buy this green machine, just to preserve it.
I already have an Odeon 9102, that I was able to buy last year.

It could be interesting also to know what logo is found inside the lid of this machine. And yes, it is easy to forget that HMV exported machines, and that some of these models have unique details, as on this machine, also a logo, that I myself for sure never have seen before. I have seen colored HMV portables exported to Scandinavia, models with the same fittings and logo that one would expect from a HMV, but this logo is different, so yes...it is branded in a different way.

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Re: A green Columbia 211A, reupholstered?

Post by epigramophone »

Although indistinct, the logo inside the lid appears to be Odeon.

Oedipus
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Re: A green Columbia 211A, reupholstered?

Post by Oedipus »

I've certainly seen a green 211 -- I used to own one. Re Odeon, I took it as read that the label inside the lid was 'Odeon' -- perhaps it should be explained that Odeon was part of the Lindstroem group when it was taken over by Columbia in the late 1920s, and thus came into the EMI fold in 1931. But Odeon was not a brand name that was used on machines in the UK after WW1, although it did appear on some Parlophone records as 'ODEON SERIES'.

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Re: A green Columbia 211A, reupholstered?

Post by nostalgia »

Roger, Oedipus, thank you for the information, and I agree, it seems to be an Odeon.
I am somewhat familiar with the history of the Lindstrom group being aqcuired by HMV/EMI in 1931, and understand these machines also must have been manufactured at Hayes. Since they are pretty hard to find, I made an offer on this machine, that was accepted. If everything turns out as planned, it will be in my hands in some days. I wanted to preserve it, instead of it possibly ending up as a toy, or worse..on the landfill.

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Re: A green Columbia 211A, reupholstered?

Post by nostalgia »

Here it is, and you were right, it is an Odeon, in not too pretty bad shape, even if it is not yet cleaned. I don't know what we should call it, and Odeon 211 A, or Columbia 211A, but it is for sure green. :mrgreen: As we can see, it seems to originally have been exported to as far away as Argentina!
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Re: A green Columbia 211A, reupholstered?

Post by Inigo »

Odeon in Argentina was a powerful company. Maybe they imported these machines from HMV, purposely rebadged Odeon for sale in Argentina by them.
Inigo

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