The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

Ortho_Fan—great job on the poster.

Was there once a make-your-own-table-top-version craze, to explain all these chopped machines? With as many of them that seem to turn up on Craigslist, it would almost appear to have been a fad at one point or another...

— MordEth

In my neck of the woods, many 'chopped' machines are that way because of the ravages of the 1937 flood of the Ohio River (and other smaller subsequent floods) that damaged the bottoms of the cabinets. In 2007, there was a 'celebration' of sorts of the 70th anniversary of the '37 flood. Louisville public radio had a series of audio interviews with people who remembered the flood. One elderly woman told about how her family had to retreat to the third floor of their home during the highest stage of the flood, and when she was allowed to descend the stairs to look into the parlor a few days later, she observed a square grand piano floating in the water with the family's Victrola placed safely on top.

Here's a Louisville-found 'chopper' I have in my shop right now. I bought it because it was ultra-cheap and has an Edisonic reproducer on it. Not the full chop, but no doubt because of flood damage:
John M

Floods, that explains it! I've wondered why there are so many chopped phonographs out there.
Damage due to flooding seems very reasonable.

Now that I look at my 'chopper', I recall that there is a dealer plate inside from 'G.A. Frentzel/Pianos And Phonographs/Cincinnati, O.' Cinci is less than 100 miles up-river from Louisville, and while much of Cincinnati sits on high ground, the low areas are subject to the same Ohio River flooding as Louisville. My 'chopper' could have been flooded in either city depending upon where it was in '37. It is ironic -- and perhaps telling -- that the 'chopper' on Craigslist that started this post is also a Cincinnati machine.

John M