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Greetings, everyone. I went to an estate sale this weekend and picked up what I thought were 10 intact brown wax cylinders, and three broken brown wax cylinders. (I also picked up 15 black wax cylinders in a cardboard cylinder box.) When I got home and looked them over I discovered that one of the "good" cylinders had a crack running its entire length. (Oh, well; at least I know it was there when I bought it, and that it didn't happen on the way home.) If anyone has any tips on "fixing" that crack, please share. I know from other posts that brown wax is very tricky to repair (some say impossible), and though I have heard Dr. K does great work, I probably don't want to sink that kind of money into repairing a 2" cylinder, contents unknown. So, unless I can figure out how to do it myself, it will probably stay cracked. Again, any and all tips welcome.

So: I have found thousands of cylinders in the wild over the past few decades, but only a very few are brown wax, and of those, maybe a dozen (all found without cases) aren't moldy; so yesterday's find almost doubles that number. (Fun fact: One of the ones I have from a previous find is President McKinley's inaugural address.) It was a good day. Five of the nine intact cylinders did not have cases -- they were in a carrying case, along with the cracked one and the broken ones -- but four of them did. (For now, I am storing the uncased ones in later Columbia cases; all were empty for years, and hopefully none had any mold still in them.) However, they are unlike any cases I have ever seen, and I am hoping to learn more about them.

As you can see, they have no labels, and are stamped with the name and address of the Eastern Talking Machine Company, and early phonograph dealer in Boston. I happen to own a pretty early Columbia Eagle (see last picture for serial number) that was sold by the same company, which replaced Columbia's nameplate with its own (see second-to-last picture). I know nothing else about the company and can't find any information about it online; if anyone knows anything about them, I hope you will consider sharing!

On to the cylinders: I have listened to all nine, now, using listening tubes. Some are very faint, and some are surprisingly loud and clear. All seem to be Columbias, although one or two have no opening announcement at all, and one or two have an announcement that identifies the song and artist but not the company. Of those that do identify the company, all say The Columbia Phonograph Company; some add "of New York City," at least one adds "of New York," and at least one adds "of Washington, D.C." I don't know if that can help date them or not.

Most, maybe all, of the four cylinders in the cases appear never to have been opened. One had the cotton wadding wrapped in something like cellophane. There was also wadded up cellophane (?) in the case. (I didn't buy the case -- they were asking much, much more for it than they were for all the cylinders put together, and it wasn't anything special.) The case also had a lot of title slips in it -- many more than there were cylinders -- some printed, some handwritten. (See pictures.) I assume some of them go with the uncased cylinders I have.

The four in cases all had their wadding and original title slip. (Side note: If anyone has figured out how to successfully slide a wrapped cylinder back into its case, please let me know!) They are:

1. Anvil Chorus -- Columbia Phonograph Company of New York City
2. Nearer My God to Thee -- company not identified
3. Gladstone's Message to Edison -- no announcement
4. Talmage on Infidelity -- no announcement

I have so many questions about this find that I don't know where to start, or really what to ask. My first question would be: When were these made? Do recordings of any of them exist online somewhere? For that matter, is there a resource somewhere listing Columbia brown wax cylinders? Is anyone familiar with any of these particular records? Does anyone know if it was common for cylinders to be cased like this? That is, did dealerships often sell cylinders in plain cases with their name stamped on them, rather than a company (Edison, Columbia, etc.) label? Did these pre-date company labels? Did the dealership write the names on the lids, or the company, or the customers? If anyone out there has others like these -- either from Eastern Phonograph or another dealership -- I hope you will consider posting pictures. And if you should have an answer to a question I don't even know enough to ask (like the best way to preserve these, handle them, store them, listen to them, etc.), please share that, too.

Thanks!

P.S. I made sure to ask and was told, sadly, that there were no more (nor any machine) where these came from.

That's a nice find, congratulations!

There's a mention of the company in this 1996 article. Info may have been revised since then?
https://archive.org/details/V78J10/page/n41/mode/2up

Here's some discussion from an old threads.
viewtopic.php?t=31439
https://forum.antiquephono.org/topic/32 ... e-b-eagle/

A bit more from Tim Gracyk...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gz7uaBfbOFY
"A catalog issued in 1898 by Columbia's New England headquarters--the Eastern Talking Machine Company at 17 Tremont Street, Boston..."

Some legal issues ...
https://books.google.com/books?id=BZwKA ... 22&f=false

Here’s some information for dating the Columbia cylinders from the Tinfoil Resource Center.

Rich Gordon

I know of many recordings of McKinley's last public address before being shot, but this is the first I've heard of a recording of his inaugural address. Of course, McKinley himself never recorded anything; there records are all made by actors.

What you're describing as cellophane is almost certainly wax paper. Brown wax cylinders were first wrapped in cotton batting, then in wax paper. The wax paper made it much easier to slide the cylinder and cotton out of the box. Unfortunately, the wax paper was usually so thin it became torn quickly and was generally discarded. Some of the early Edison black wax records were also packaged this way.

Thanks for the links, and the info! This is a real mystery to me, and every clue is very helpful. I played part of one of the broken cylinders -- it's in 3 pieces, but all are clean, with no missing chips -- and it's another Washington D.C., so I would really like to get that one "fixed," if at all possible. Other than Dr. K, are there other people out there doing this work? I hear he has a very long waiting list.

I remain surprised at how little info there is online about ETMCo., especially considering how much business they seem to have done, and how long they were in business. As these are the oldest cased cylinders I have ever come across, I'm also wondering if it was a common practice for jobbers to "brand" cylinders themselves like this. Does anyone have similar boxes from other jobbers?

The McKinley inauguration -- it was his first one, from March 4, 1897 -- was a fun find. I had no idea what it was -- it's very faint, and has no opening announcement -- and I had to stick one of those little handheld digital recorders into the horn while it was playing, then play the recording back many times and write down sentences or phrases so I could google them -- that's how I figured out what it was. Of course, it's quite condensed, and read by an actor. I listened to part of "Gladstone's Message to Edison" and can't tell if it's an actor or actually Gladstone -- it seems he actually did record his message in 1888. Kind of surprising to find this on a Columbia record! Has anyone heard it? Is it available online somewhere?

I have looked in vain for an online list of Columbia brown wax cylinders; is there one somewhere? And why does it seem like every brown wax cylinder I have found (except for blanks) is a Columbia? Do those slips look like standard Columbia slips?

Finally, I would appreciate any tips on preserving these and keeping them safe from mold, etc. As I said, of all the brown wax cylinders I have ever come across, fewer than two dozen were mold-free.

Thanks again!

Hi

A fairly complete listing of all known Columbia brown wax cylinders was compiled years ago by Ken Lorenz. It has been digitized and available at Archive.org

You will note that many so-called "historic" cylinders were also the subject of general commercial interest and thus advertised in periodic catalogs (but by unnamed elocutionists). Messages "from/of Gladstone" were indeed popular but rarely (if ever) by Gladstone himself (for obvious reasons).

Brown wax cylinders can sometimes be dated by factors such as color, rpm, and the arrangement/sequence of the interior rib structure. This is further complicated by the fact that Edison sold recording blanks to Columbia for musical transcription for several years.

The re-discovery of several "Jules Verne" cylinders in 2006 was a hoax. (See Sep 2022 AP).

Allen

Try to search by Ken Lorenz or Ken Lorenz Columbia Cylinders at Archive.org, ain't nothing turns up.

Hi

Give this URL a try:

https://archive.org/details/Kastlemusic ... s/mode/2up

His full name was Kenneth M. Lorenz and the Columbia cylinders listed (brown wax and black) ran from 1896-1909.
Columbia had been making and selling their first cylinders since 1890.

There are 44 scans and the #s run numerically.

Allen

AllenKoe wrote: Sat Sep 17, 2022 4:46 pm Hi

Give this URL a try:

https://archive.org/details/Kastlemusic ... s/mode/2up

Thanks !

Zenger wrote: Wed Sep 14, 2022 7:14 pm Thanks for the links, and the info! This is a real mystery to me, and every clue is very helpful. I played part of one of the broken cylinders -- it's in 3 pieces, but all are clean, with no missing chips -- and it's another Washington D.C., so I would really like to get that one "fixed," if at all possible. Other than Dr. K, are there other people out there doing this work? I hear he has a very long waiting list.

I remain surprised at how little info there is online about ETMCo., especially considering how much business they seem to have done, and how long they were in business. As these are the oldest cased cylinders I have ever come across, I'm also wondering if it was a common practice for jobbers to "brand" cylinders themselves like this. Does anyone have similar boxes from other jobbers?

The McKinley inauguration -- it was his first one, from March 4, 1897 -- was a fun find. I had no idea what it was -- it's very faint, and has no opening announcement -- and I had to stick one of those little handheld digital recorders into the horn while it was playing, then play the recording back many times and write down sentences or phrases so I could google them -- that's how I figured out what it was. Of course, it's quite condensed, and read by an actor. I listened to part of "Gladstone's Message to Edison" and can't tell if it's an actor or actually Gladstone -- it seems he actually did record his message in 1888. Kind of surprising to find this on a Columbia record! Has anyone heard it? Is it available online somewhere?

I have looked in vain for an online list of Columbia brown wax cylinders; is there one somewhere? And why does it seem like every brown wax cylinder I have found (except for blanks) is a Columbia? Do those slips look like standard Columbia slips?

Finally, I would appreciate any tips on preserving these and keeping them safe from mold, etc. As I said, of all the brown wax cylinders I have ever come across, fewer than two dozen were mold-free.

Thanks again!

With the launch of consumer phonographs, the novelty of having a speech by Gladstone or McKinley was exciting. Len Spencer spent much time in the studio in the early days making speech recreations.

You can hear a Len Spencer recreation of Gladstone on YouTube which obviously duped the uploader. Here is the genuine Gladstone from Colonel Gouraud's home in Norwood, South London in 1888:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0F957zdE3m8

Compare the real Gladstone with the Len Spencer recreation:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6-2eZwUZKk

Spencer's voice is quite distinctive and I believe there are his McKinley oratories on YouTube purported to be the real thing.

Finally listen to Spencer in the Edison Advertising cylinder he made in 1906. Hear any resemblance?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tXoeck_89qc

Note Gouraud had by the fall of 1888 gained the knack how to focus his voice into the recording apparatus to get a clear result. The technically unsophisticated Gladstone, despite his renowned oratory skills, was too far away and was not aware how to focus his voice. Gladstone was born a few months after Abraham Lincoln and at 78 years, we must be grateful he lived long enough to have his voice preserved. Gouraud, born in Niagara Falls NY, was obviously in awe of his guest and was probably reluctant to give Gladstone further instruction. Alfred Landfrey, Florence Nightigale and P.T. Barnum were each less intimidating (even Barnum?) and likely welcomed instruction how to properly direct their voices so that records sound quite clear.

The Spencer recordings are good for what they are and I like to listen to them!