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Can anyone date this Berliner?

Posted: Mon Jan 24, 2022 9:58 am
by epigramophone
Bearing number 29X and with a latest patent date of February 19th 1895, this 7 inch Berliner is undated.
Can anyone please tell me when and where it was recorded, or how to find out for myself?

Re: Can anyone date this Berliner?

Posted: Mon Jan 24, 2022 10:17 am
by Charles Batchelor
New York, possibly 1897 but more probably 1898.
See "E. Berliner's Gramophone: Physical Characteristics and Label Iconography of the 7-inch American Berliner Record, 1892-1900"
Unfortunately no longer in print.

Re: Can anyone date this Berliner?

Posted: Mon Jan 24, 2022 10:24 am
by OrthoFan
29X is listed on this page -- https://adp.library.ucsb.edu/index.php/ ... erliner_29 -- but only a date range (Feb. 1898-Mar. 1899) is provided.

OrthoFan

Re: Can anyone date this Berliner?

Posted: Mon Jan 24, 2022 2:06 pm
by epigramophone
Thank you gentlemen. I will happily settle for 1898.

Re: Can anyone date this Berliner?

Posted: Mon Jan 24, 2022 3:06 pm
by MATTROSE94
1898 sounds about right. The Berliners I have with that particular typeset are all from 1898.

Re: Can anyone date this Berliner?

Posted: Mon Jan 24, 2022 6:03 pm
by Dischoard
I posted a bunch of Berliners to Discogs and one of them, with the same font/typeface as yours, garnered this edit to the notes section:

"Label style shown in image, with four patent dates and fancy sans-serif typeface, was used exclusively on NYC recordings made from March to June, 1898."

No source was given but he seemed very confident ;)

Re: Can anyone date this Berliner?

Posted: Wed Jan 26, 2022 11:52 am
by Inigo
That's nice... I never thought of making my database in Discogs... I have it in Excel... But maybe in Discogs you can also search by any field, etc... I have to see it with other eyes. How interesting!

Re: Can anyone date this Berliner?

Posted: Fri Jan 28, 2022 2:01 pm
by Dischoard
Inigo wrote: Wed Jan 26, 2022 11:52 am That's nice... I never thought of making my database in Discogs... I have it in Excel... But maybe in Discogs you can also search by any field, etc... I have to see it with other eyes. How interesting!
It's actually become a side-hobby and it's fun when I find that I have in my hand a disc that hasn't been entered into the database yet. There are a few users whose usernames have become second nature, not a lot of us collecting and cataloging shellac. But the cool thing is I can search through my collection using Discogs then locate it in my stacks as I keep notes on each release. Photos included. It's just that sometimes I forget to remove them from Discogs when I remove them from my collection, I need to get better about that but it's even hard for me to click "remove from collection", such a mind trip this collection thing is ;)

Re: Can anyone date this Berliner?

Posted: Sat Jan 29, 2022 5:34 am
by Inigo
Even if I remove a record from my collection, I never remove it from my database... I simply add a key signature (the field code telling me where a record is shelved) meaning that the record isn't there anymore. But I still keep the data, for it's always interesting for help when dating other records in the matrix series, etc.
So in Discogs, you could simply add a note instead of removing the data. They are useful for someone else...

Re: Can anyone date this Berliner?

Posted: Sat Jan 29, 2022 9:06 am
by Menophanes
Dischoard wrote: Mon Jan 24, 2022 6:03 pm I posted a bunch of Berliners to Discogs and one of them, with the same font/typeface as yours, garnered this edit to the notes section:

"Label style shown in image, with four patent dates and fancy sans-serif typeface, was used exclusively on NYC recordings made from March to June, 1898."

No source was given but he seemed very confident ;)
But consider this record of mine (No. 3404, Jessie the Flower of Dumblane, cornet solo by W. Paris Chambers). It has an additional patent date (29 Oct. 1895 – not clear in the image), but the other features are identical to those under discussion, and the recording date seems to be 24 August 1897; admittedly the 7 is incomplete, but it clearly has a horizontal stroke at the top and I do not see how else it could be read, since it could not possibly be a 5 or a 3. Why would records made in 1898 omit the latest patent date shown in the previous year?

Oliver Mundy.
berliner_3404_chambers.jpg