The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

Butthurt is jumping down other posters throats because they don't match your exact ideals of "excellence". Apologies, you and Mark are far superior to every other collector on the forum. You people are unbelievable...

Orthofan, thank you for being helpful, instead of being a gripy old man. I will be using this resource from here on our. I guess I never believed I would see a day when asking a simple question would turn into a debate on how lazy I am. Thanks again.

All,

I did not mean to offend anyone but did want to inspire some curiosity. It seems to have worked.
My apologies to forum members if I came on too strong. Sometimes I forget that some of you don’t have the experience or reference materials of some of us. Right, there are no dumb questions (except maybe one like, which end of the needle is supposed to touch the record, the pointy end or the other one?) but I would expect some effort on the information seeker’s part before simply posting the question to the forum. At least tell us where you looked so we don’t need to retrace your steps.

A little research uncovers the patent number for this record adapter as 874,985 assigned to the Arthur J O’Neil Company as the OP learned from Tim Fabrizio.

https://patentimages.storage.googleapis ... 874985.pdf

Notice that the date stamped on the part was the expected grant date of December 20, 1907 but the actual grant date was December 31, 1907. It is helpful to bear this in mind when searching the patent records.

Allen Koenigsberg has a nice write up about the Arentino patent in his book “The Patent History of the Phonograph” .Don’t know if this volume is still available. It contains lots of good information.

Now, please tell us about your record haul!
Mark

MarkELynch wrote: Thu May 11, 2023 10:40 pm All,

I did not mean to offend anyone but did want to inspire some curiosity. It seems to have worked.
My apologies to forum members if I came on too strong. Sometimes I forget that some of you don’t have the experience or reference materials of some of us. Right, there are no dumb questions (except maybe one like, which end of the needle is supposed to touch the record, the pointy end or the other one?) but I would expect some effort on the information seeker’s part before simply posting the question to the forum. At least tell us where you looked so we don’t need to retrace your steps.

A little research uncovers the patent number for this record adapter as 874,985 assigned to the Arthur J O’Neil Company as the OP learned from Tim Fabrizio.

https://patentimages.storage.googleapis ... 874985.pdf

Notice that the date stamped on the part was the expected grant date of December 20, 1907 but the actual grant date was December 31, 1907. It is helpful to bear this in mind when searching the patent records.

Allen Koenigsberg has a nice write up about the Arentino patent in his book “The Patent History of the Phonograph” .Don’t know if this volume is still available. It contains lots of good information.

Now, please tell us about your record haul!
Mark

What's wrong with asking here first? Is this supposed to be the information source of last resort? I guess if I were new to this hobby, with little knowledge of other sources, I'd be tempted to ask my question on something called "The Talking Machine Forum."

JerryVan wrote: Fri May 12, 2023 6:34 am What's wrong with asking here first? Is this supposed to be the information source of last resort? I guess if I were new to this hobby, with little knowledge of other sources, I'd be tempted to ask my question on something called "The Talking Machine Forum."

Agree totally. Along this line, when a person is relatively new to a hobby, or really anything, it's very hard to know what resources are readily available to answer whatever questions come up. (For me, personally, it's kind of like trying to look up a word in a {paper based} dictionary that you don't know how to spell. Try looking up xenophobia if you've never seen it in print.)

While online search sites--Google, probably more than most--can be very helpful, you really have to know what to ask in order to get meaningful results. A major problem with Google is the fact that the most popular searches are displayed at the top, so if I search for "Victrola", the first thing I'll see are numerous references to those cheap, newly produced pieces of "it-shay" or "ap-cray" sold today. (Love pig Latin ) Much farther down the list is the jump to the Victor Victrola page -- http://www.victor-victrola.com/

(Google search tip # 342 -- if you add &num=100 to the end of Google's URL string which is displayed on the search results page at the top of your browser's screen and then press your "enter" key, you'll get an unbroken list of all hits up to 100, rather than having to cull through multiple pages. You can change the number to display as many "hits" as you want.)

(Google search tip # 343 -- Google's advanced search page is useful if you want to narrow down or limit the information you are looking for -- https://www.google.com/advanced_search )

I guess this is just a long-winded way to say, all posters using this forum should feel free to ask about anything they want.

OrthoFan

Hi Mark and others,

This Aretino Adaptor was indeed observed as existing back in 1990 (in PHP) and as having an 'incorrect' patent date. In that time period, all patents were issued on a Tuesday - and that would work out to Dec. 31, 1907 for Mr O'Neill. Hard to say whose (original) mistake it was to cast these with the impossible date of Dec 20 (Fri). 'Tuesday' announcements began in Jan 1848. Before that, it was Sat, etc. and before THAT, there was a time when US patents didn't even have numbers (pre-1836)! Obviously a simpler world...

The next puzzle, now being solved at the AP Printer (=June issue), is when the first sculptured Bust of Thomas Edison was made. Did it survive? Did it affect TAE's hearing?

Best
Allen

AllenKoe wrote: Fri May 12, 2023 5:25 pm Hi Mark and others,....
The next puzzle, now being solved at the AP Printer (=June issue), is when the first sculptured Bust of Thomas Edison was made. Did it survive? Did it affect TAE's hearing?

Best
Allen

Is it this one?

https://www.si.edu/object/nmah_713118

Well done, very close. Do you also know the sculptor's first name and who assisted him (where), and the date when it was made (and where it was found)?

And what about the bumps on his head?

Allen

AllenKoe wrote: Fri May 12, 2023 6:09 pm Well done, very close. Do you also know the sculptor's first name and who assisted him (where), and the date when it was made (and where it was found)?

And what about the bumps on his head?

Allen

At this point, no. Gotta save something for the AP June issue.

OF