The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

I have an Indestructible cylinder record of "A Signal from Mars", and watched with interest as another copy of the record sold for $160+ on eBay within the last year (sold by one of our TMF members).

Bob

john9ten wrote:

edisonplayer wrote:The black and silver Columbia that you have of President McKinley's speech isn't by the man himself. It was recorded posthumously by either Len or Harry Spencer.Some people think it's actually McKinley speaking, but it's not edisonplayer.

I think the clue there is that the label actually says the speech was by the "Late" president...if someone thinks it was given by the president himself, it must have been via Ouija board!

Not necessarily. I have a few Billy Williams discs where "the late" was added in front of his name on pressings made after he died in 1915.
I guess the big difference here though is that it's included in the title, and no artist is actually credited.
I don't know whether like you occasionally find with Edison cylinders, the Columbia catalogue included the artist's name but was left off the record itself?

Whether Columbia titled this record with the intention to deceive or not, there was probably a large percentage of the public who had no idea what the president actually sounded like in pre radio days, and probably thought they were listening to the president himself.