A machine with our name!

[epigramophone]

I saw an "assembled/off brand" horizontal grand for sale recently with "our" name inside the lid.

I was not tempted to buy it, but I could not resist posting the image, which is less than perfect as the conditions were not ideal :

[whoopinola]

Last summer I was attending an old car meet at our local heritage society..Lia and I have a 1954 chev pick-up that we cruise with...The manager of the museum told us .."There's a beat-up old gramophone out back , don't know how it got here , if you're interested take it , it's going in the burn pile if you don't"...well , what we found was , "interesting"...It was big , same size as a VV-XIV....it looked ornate , and it didn't have a makers mark anywhere....so into the truck it went and we took it home...There we disassembled it ..still no indication of who made it ,or where...very little of the tone arm was left , no reproducer...the motor had a broken spring , and was a single spring of unknown heritage that would be more at home in a suit-case...the ornateness was all applied composite and much was missing....So , what to do?..It was too far gone to restore..a complete unknown..but too nice to trash it , so I made a "hot rod" out of it..It got a Victor motor , a Phonola tone arm and repoducer , and various bits and bobs from the parts bin..the case was refinished,and it looked and sounded pretty good...at this point a local sign maker's serices were engaged , He made me decals , and ID tags for the fictious "Whoopinola".{my nickname that goes way back to my railroad days}...and the equally fictious "Phillips Phonograph Co"...It's been a bit of fun , and it will make collectors in the future go..."What?????...HMMMMMM"

[Lenoirstreetguy]

The Whoopinola is a hoot! And you're a good Southwestern Ontario lad as well! The nameplate plus one from RS Williams will make posterity scratch its head. Was the RS Williams plate in the machine when you got it?

Jim

[whoopinola]

Hello Jim...The RS Williams tag came off of a Phonola that some one had chopped in half making a table topish machine...

[Lucius1958]

As for the "Forum": you need the right needles for this one...

"They're cute, and have little 'Gladiator Tips' "......

(Props if you know where that quote comes from)

[FloridaClay]

"The Whoopinola," what fun! And it looks great as well.

Clay

[HisMastersVoice]

I have moved the 4 pages of off-topic conversation to the UK Forum and created a new topic:

The Old UK Forum

Please do not discuss it further here.