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There was a recent thread about what appeared to be a mahogany Victor V in the ebay section of the Forum. At first glance the machine appeared to be a mahogany Victor V but with closer inspection it was a typical oak machine with a mahogany colored finish applied over the oak. Is there any historical evidence that dealers or perhaps post sales business offered to change the appearance of cabinets? Thanks, Jerry Blais

Dark Oak was often a selection the dealers offered in that period. It may very well be a standard finish available at the time?

Larry

I'm talking about taking a oak machine and altering the finish to look like mahogany. A few years ago at Union there was a Vic III and the seller was certain that it was mahogany. The finish appeared very old but upon careful inspection, it was oak not mahogany. Were there dealers or business that would alter the appearance of machines or pieces of furniture? Thanks, Jerry

Jerry---I have wondered the same thing myself. I got a rather ratty "mahogany" matching record cabinet for the Edison B-80, that---when I got it out of the seller's basement into the daylight---was a mahogany finished oak. They used some form of pigmented varnish-stain, and it appeared to be quite an old finish. It was a tidy job, no clods of dust or stray brush hairs embedded in the finish, it was a low-gloss finish too. They went as far as finishing most of the cabinet interior as well (although not beyond the record slats). Since my B-80 is mahogany, I won't likely refinish the record cabinet back to oak, but part of me feels like I should.

I doubt very many dealers got involved with trying to make changes by refinishing entire cabinets as that would have been a lot of work in those days. Those old varnishes took about a week between coats under the best of circumstance. There were dealers that would customize cabinets a little by painting decorations on them and that sort of thing. I used to have a drawer out of an L door Victrola that had a vignette of nipper painted on the front of it. I'll have to hunt around as I know I have some pictures of it. Most of those kinds of "tune-ups" were done later on when the colored varnishes that we think of today started coming out in the late 30's or so. They did have some faster drying finishes in the teens and twenties, but with color in them, they would have been very difficult to apply with a brush and have turn out right, and any hint of wax or polish would have been a disaster. Those are also the finishes that tend to craze & crack badly over time. Especially if they are exposed to heat or direct sunlight. I have seen things like that over the years that makes me think it may have been done at the factory. A friend of mine used to have a Regina Music Box disk cabinet that was mahogany except the lid was quarter sawn oak. You could barely make out the grain under all that red finish, but the bottom side had hardly any finish on it and the truth was told there...Ha! Even saw a HUGE run in the varnish over the decal on an Amberola 1-A which made me chuckle.
My Diamond disk machine that I've had for over 40 years now came with blue grille cloth with white stars that are different sizes all over it. Dad bought it from the original owner and I questioned him and his son about that fabric and they were surprised that I asked about it. I just said that I'd never seen another Edison (Chippendale) with material like that and the Father said something like "We bought that thing new in 1917 or 18 and every Edison in his store had the same material over the horn" His son said the same thing. He helped load it into the wagon when they took it home.
There was also a piano dealer in Chicago that had small scale light fixtures made up in the 20's that looked just like wall sconces out of a house but used small sized bulbs like in a Christmas tree string and had a pair of them put on both sides of the spoolbox. Those are really nice looking and probably sold a lot of pianos for the guy. I've never owned one of those pianos, but I've seen a few. And old piano guy that lived in Chicago his whole life had one and told me that.
Once the spray finishes (Du Pont Lacquer) came out late in 1923 then the factory could get away with a lot, and they often did. Those old brushing varnishes are nice if you take the time to flow them out, but very slow. I still have 6-8 gallons of varnish that was canned in 1913 and I've used a few gallons of it on some furniture and it really looks nice when it's done, but it will take 3-4 months to finish what you start with that stuff. Even the varnishes in the 40's were pretty slow by today's way of thinking. I've refinished a few phonographs with that. If you see a more expensive mahogany Victrola or Edison with a piano finish in varnish, you'll understand why so many of them sold that way. It REALLY looks nice. They really used nice veneers on the more expensive machines. Oak turns out ok almost no matter what you do for finish on it. Even polyurethane.