Something's Coming

[TAP]

In the current Nauck auction I have just been reading at number 152 (ViLMJ 3001 S.H. Dudley: When Reuben Comes To Town): "The world's 1st 10" record!"

This can no longer be upheld! Read the article “Delight in the Find” in the March issue of “The Antique Phonograph.”

Is it bad if I ask, what is the worlds first 10” record?

As a early Berliner record collector, It was exciting to read the APS article about the newly found 1891 American Berliner record. One of the writers mentioned he saw an American 10-inch Berliner record of the same time-period. This would be the first 10-inch record known. The related (and to me of more historical interest) question would be: what was the first 10-inch record made for sale? That is unlikely to be an early 1890’s Berliner. All the commercial machines of this period were hand-winds with a flywheel so close to the small turntable that no record much bigger than the 6-inch would fit. The Berliner hand-wind phonograph a few years later could accommodate up to a 7-inch record. Perhaps Berliner was distributing these 10-inch records to encourage manufacturers to start making 10-inch record capable machines?

I vote for the Eldridge Johnson TEN INCH records as the first commercially available 10-inch record. Dudley/ When Reuben Comes to Town (#3001) was recorded on the first day, January 3, 1901. The initial week’s records carried the rare TEN INCH label. The specific record in Nauck’s catalog does not have a TEN INCH label and likely was recorded later.

[Starkton]

The 10-inch Berliner from 1891, described and illustrated in the article, has all the characteristics of a marketable product. The sale cannot be ruled out, a gramophone of suitable size was manufactured, see below. It could have been sold in the USA as well as in Germany. The patent data on the record label allowed and suggested this.

Here is a drawing of a large size model. A 10-inch record fits easily on the turntable. On the base plate you can see different sizes of Berliner discs (seemingly 5", 6", 8", 10") stacked on top of each other.

This model, likely of U.S. manufacture, is hand-driven, but between 1890 and 1895 a wide range of Berliner gramophones with various types of drive (spring motor, weight drive, electric drive) were offered in Europe.