Dearest Steve and Carlos, it's somewhat soothing - although sad - to read that the market in UK and France is not so different than here. Indeed I thought that things were a bit better in UK: there are some fairly well-made websites where gramophones are sold on a regular basis. Although I must admit that, when I tried to put my hands on an "external horner" and then wrote to them, I got back pictures that shown rusty gramophones in need of a lot of repairs (or got no reply at all, in at least two cases).
On the other hand, one would think that France is the
walhalla of Pathé and vertical records... But a quick check over the French section of that-famous-auction-site reveals that perhaps it isn't so, as Carlos seems to confirm in full.
And now, let's come to our American counterparts...
Just kidding!
Indeed George we appreciate your solidarity. I have to fully second Steve's and Carlos' sentiments: I'm literally open-mouthed when I see whichever gramophone meeting in the US. Even at the lesser ones we see more gramophones than inside the best specialised museums over here. And - to add insult to injury - those machines are not untouchable items behind a shrine, but one could carry them home by simply paying for them.
Many of the reasons why here things aren't just as florid have been well discussed by Steve. Concerning Italy, I think it has also to be added that - during the gramophone heydays - it was a poor and economically underdeveloped country. Well, to be frank, it has ever been and still is underdeveloped, compared to other European partners, but in those days (before and after WWI) the comparison was even more disheartening. Aside few rich nobles or businessmen, the vast majority of citizens lived on "subsistence economy" even in bigger towns. Gramophones were definitely off of most people's thoughts. Well up to the '20s, strong emigration and other facts like Mussolini's
battle for grain confirm that Italy still had unresolved issues even with food - go figure gramophones. I think this explains why also early records are so hard to find. As a counterproof, records issued in the '50s, during the
economic boom, can be found everywhere.
Also, aggravating a general lack of sense of history and apathy towards collectionism, Italian houses are very small in average. And apartments aside, few people owns a garage. So it has always been customary (necessary...) for most people to discard old households - like gramophones or tube radios - or to move them to wet cellars or overheated attics, where they had been destroyed anyway and then dumped later.
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