The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

This is a great thread indeed. I have some great history on a few of my machines I'd love to share later when I have some time here. Ever since I've been at this, now well over 30 years, I've always inquired about where things cam from. It really does add to the fun.

Probably the coolest story I have is behind my Japanese lacquer VV-130. It was bought new in 1922 from Alonso Wilkes, inc. in Amsterdam NY by a Czech family that had immigrated here and started and owned a glove factory. They were prosperous enough to live in a beautiful 18 room house on Trinity Place in the city. The Depression hit them hard and their business failed to the point where they ended up taking boarders in to make ends meet, yet they never lost the house. It was an amazing time capsule, nothing had been touched in there since the 30s, light fixtures, stained glass windows, moldings, wallpaper, furniture, appliances, you name it. The machine ended up being banished to the third floor attic / movie room where it sat untouched for decades. Sometime in the late 90s, the property which had been empty for several years fell into tax arrears and the contents of the whole house were auctioned off, fixtures and all. The house was later auctioned off for a few thousand dollars and later demolished to make room for a parking lot. I was lucky enough to see it before it happened. I regret having not been able to attend the sale because of the blizzard we had because I probably would have bought the earlier XVI this 130 replaced and the Spartan changer that replaced the 130

It's one of those machines I treasure and I'll never part with. The back story was just the icing on the cake. The attached photos is the machine the day I picked it up from the auction house.

Sean

I added our family heirloom - a c.1906 Edison Home Model B, in custom cabinet with H&S red Morning Glory horn - to the "Featured Phonographs - The Edison Co." forum section in December 2016. Please be sure to check out the section if you haven't; here is a link to mine in particular: http://forum.talkingmachine.info/viewto ... 63&start=0

My wife Sharon's great uncle Ralph's apparently jackknife carved-in initials, can be seen on the underside of the motor board from the home-made cabinet he apparently made from a small bureau (the remains of which had been used to store the records with the Phonograph atop). The bureau, sadly is no more. The initials are "RA", for Ralph Alouisius. This Phonograph and its records, survived Sharon's great grandparents two farms - the first one was in Warsaw, NY, but was auctioned off in 1929; the second was located in Honeoye Falls, NY.

Ralph died on July 22, 1943 at the age of 43, after a tragic accidental poisoning while applying cyanide gas during his fumigation of the Central Hotel in Lackawanna, NY.

Sharon's great grandmother Sophie passed away in 1961 (predeceased by her husband August, in 1938) at which point many of the home's furnishings were divided among her 3 remaining children; Leon, Mildred (Sharon's grandmother), Harvey, their spouses, their children and grandchildren. Harvey had never married, and was the only child to have remained working on the farm after their father August's death.

The Phonograph and records may have actually been given to Sharon's grandparents well before Sophie's death in 1961, we just don't know.

In the 1970's, the farmhouse burned down, and Harvey sold the farm to a neighboring, much larger dairy farm family. Sadly the remaining barn burned down in the mid-80's (IIRC), and there's nothing left of the farm for us to see any longer.

Sharon's grandparents had gotten married and eventually moved off the farm in the early 30's, to live in Rochester, NY in an apartment. After the birth of Sharon's mother in 1932, they bought the home right next door to the apartment they had been renting. Sharon's grandfather Albert passed away in 1959, one year before Sharon's birth.

The home still remains in the neighborhood which had become very violent and rundown, but grandmother Mildred defiantly stayed in her beautiful island-like haven of a home, despite the rapid degeneration of the area she had loved so much. In the 1970's there were a series of rapes perpetrated against older women, one involving a friend of hers who lived catty corner behind her home. These rapes initiated the "Take Back The Night" movement in the City of Rochester, still recalled by some few of us "older" folks. The culprit was eventually determined to have been a longtime next-door neighbor's teen son. She had known him his entire life.

We would take our 2 youngs boys to visit her every Sunday in the years before her death, so that I could do any home repairs she needed, maintain her 1958 Chevrolet Biscayne, and have lunch with her. She knew I was fascinated with the cylinder phonograph down in her basement rec-room, and would on occasion ask me to bring it up to her kitchen so that I could oil it, and play a record for us all. On these occasions she would be sure to tell me "...if anything should ever happen to me..." I should have have it - with a broad smile on her face, and a sly wink.

We loved her very dearly. This was a time in our lives when it seemed as if everyone, and everything, was working against my young wife and I. She was always there with encouragement, and gave us the love and support we never recieved from our "closer" family members. But that's another long, boring story - not to be shared here...

Grandma Mildred passed away in the summer of 1986, and her family Phonograph found its way to us, not long after her death. It will never leave this family - I Pray.

Best to all,
Fran

I'm jealous of you guys who have family machines in your collections.

I have 8 machines with known provenance, but none from family. There had been a Brunswick upright of unknown model, and an early production Edison S-19 in oak (with the drop-down record compartment door). But by the time I started collecting in 1967, both machines were long gone.

George P.

I hope that the history stays with these machines in the future. Being low on space for new machines, I will make it my mission to find at least one machine with a past that I can document. Thank you for all of the stories and photos.

Regardless of known history, many of these machines were there during a time that few living souls witnessed. You can still put a period record onto a period machine and at least hear a few moments from the past as it sounded in the past. It doesn't get much better than that. I think that we are a fortunate group of people to be entrusted with these time machines.

De Soto Frank wrote:I have just two machines with any sort of provenance...

The first is my Orthophonic VE 8-12X, which was originally owned by my maternal great-grandmother. Even though it left Camden as an electric VE model, great-grandma lived in pre-REA (Rural Electrification Act) Virginia, and this machine was retrofitted with a Victor four-spring motor, be a dealer, I presume.

It always lived in a dark parlor ( shades drawn, no kids allowed ), and eventually passed to a great-aunt, from whose estate I purchased it in 1985.

It is in very good shape, and I am the first person to work on it since if left VTM in 1927.


The other is a Victor XVI L-door, from 1909, whose serial plate bears the suffix "C", stamped-over previous "B" suffix. This machine came from a local antique dealer, who did a lot of estate clean-outs. The machine was another survivor of a dark parlor ( therefore, finish is perfect ! ), complete with all of its original VTLA-style box albums (mostly filled with "Patent-label" Victor records ), a few packs of Victor steel needles in black envelopes with gold printing, and the original bill-of-sale, hand-written with steel pen from John Wanamaker & Sons, Philadelphia: "Victrola & Records - $250."

The original owner's address was listed as 30 Mole St., Philadelphia.


The other semi-documented machine I have is an Edison "Home" D, bearing a brass dealer tag from "F. Lee, Compton, Calif."


About the closest I get to "provenance" with the rest of my collection, is the occasional dealer plate or decal.

I can't find the picture in Google Street View of 30 Mole St., Philadelphia, but here is the aerial view...

De Soto Frank wrote:I have just two machines with any sort of provenance...

The first is my Orthophonic VE 8-12X, which was originally owned by my maternal great-grandmother. Even though it left Camden as an electric VE model, great-grandma lived in pre-REA (Rural Electrification Act) Virginia, and this machine was retrofitted with a Victor four-spring motor, be a dealer, I presume.

It always lived in a dark parlor ( shades drawn, no kids allowed ), and eventually passed to a great-aunt, from whose estate I purchased it in 1985.

It is in very good shape, and I am the first person to work on it since if left VTM in 1927.


The other is a Victor XVI L-door, from 1909, whose serial plate bears the suffix "C", stamped-over previous "B" suffix. This machine came from a local antique dealer, who did a lot of estate clean-outs. The machine was another survivor of a dark parlor ( therefore, finish is perfect ! ), complete with all of its original VTLA-style box albums (mostly filled with "Patent-label" Victor records ), a few packs of Victor steel needles in black envelopes with gold printing, and the original bill-of-sale, hand-written with steel pen from John Wanamaker & Sons, Philadelphia: "Victrola & Records - $250."

The original owner's address was listed as 30 Mole St., Philadelphia.


The other semi-documented machine I have is an Edison "Home" D, bearing a brass dealer tag from "F. Lee, Compton, Calif."


About the closest I get to "provenance" with the rest of my collection, is the occasional dealer plate or decal.

I can't find the picture in Google Street View of 30 Mole St., Philadelphia, but here is the aerial view...

Sorry for the duplicate post, but I can't seem to delete it...

You're so right, Django. That's the big reason I love these machines so much as well. I hope you do end up documenting at least one machine and share it here!

Curt A wrote:

De Soto Frank wrote:I have just two machines with any sort of provenance...

The first is my Orthophonic VE 8-12X, which was originally owned by my maternal great-grandmother. Even though it left Camden as an electric VE model, great-grandma lived in pre-REA (Rural Electrification Act) Virginia, and this machine was retrofitted with a Victor four-spring motor, be a dealer, I presume.

It always lived in a dark parlor ( shades drawn, no kids allowed ), and eventually passed to a great-aunt, from whose estate I purchased it in 1985.

It is in very good shape, and I am the first person to work on it since if left VTM in 1927.


The other is a Victor XVI L-door, from 1909, whose serial plate bears the suffix "C", stamped-over previous "B" suffix. This machine came from a local antique dealer, who did a lot of estate clean-outs. The machine was another survivor of a dark parlor ( therefore, finish is perfect ! ), complete with all of its original VTLA-style box albums (mostly filled with "Patent-label" Victor records ), a few packs of Victor steel needles in black envelopes with gold printing, and the original bill-of-sale, hand-written with steel pen from John Wanamaker & Sons, Philadelphia: "Victrola & Records - $250."

The original owner's address was listed as 30 Mole St., Philadelphia.


The other semi-documented machine I have is an Edison "Home" D, bearing a brass dealer tag from "F. Lee, Compton, Calif."


About the closest I get to "provenance" with the rest of my collection, is the occasional dealer plate or decal.

I can't find the picture in Google Street View of 30 Mole St., Philadelphia, but here is the aerial view...

Curt -thank you !

I recall someone once telling me that Philadelphia (USPS?) re-vamped parts of their city grid map in the 1930's, and that "1910's Mole St" might not be where it was, if at all anymore...

Someday, I will connect with someone who knows for sure...



Frank

I have the Victor 260 console my Grandparents bought in 1924, along with all of the papers, records, and an early radio speaker adaptor that plugged into the tone arm.

When I found the papers, it had a lifetime warranty from Hopkins Piano Store in the Philly area.
Unfortunately, they were long out of business, so I didn't get to pay them a visit to have the spring re-greased.

I brought down to TX, had the spring re-greased, and it has been with me since '94.