The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

It is hard to break the habit of checking Craig's List a couple of times a week. While an Edison C-150 was definitely not on my short list, I saw one for $200 this morning and had to check it out. The cabinet needs a refinish, but it played well and had a 78 adopter reproducer as well as the regular Edison reproducer. Removed the grill and there was another Edison reproducer, which may have been there in its shipping cradle since new! (It would be interesting to know how that came to be!) All the reproducers play well, although the one for 78s needs new gaskets. And it came with 32 Diamond Disks and more than 50 78s, mostly batwings and VEs--all but 3 or 4 in good condion.

Needless to say at $200 it all came home with me (I didn't even haggle) and will be the next project. Will take some before and after pics and post them later.

Clay

Great deal Clay, and one hard to pass up.

Careful or you will end up like me. I have a spare room filled with these great deals and no room left to display/play them or bring home new ones. I guess that is a good problem to have, but it also forces you to not look too hard for new acquisitions.

Same here, I don't look any longer, but rather they seem to find me on their own!

Sean

Yes, I am wandering aimlessly around the house this morning trying to figure out where in the world I am going to put it when it is restored.

Clay

FloridaClay wrote:Yes, I am wandering aimlessly around the house this morning trying to figure out where in the world I am going to put it when it is restored.

Clay

You could always put it on Craig's List

Brad wrote:You could always put it on Craig's List

No way!

My favorite quotes on collecting are from an English gentleman named Arthur W. J. G. Ord-Hume, who has written extensively on collection of mechanical music machines of various sorts, primarily music boxes. He long ago formulated two "inviolate Laws of Collecting":

Ord-Hume's First Law of Collecting: Space will expand to accommodate an infinite number of possessions regardless of their size.

Ord-Hume's Second Law of Collecting: Shortage of finance, however dire, will never prevent the acquisition of an object, however improbable its cost.

Somehow it always seems to turn out that way.

Clay

FloridaClay wrote:It is hard to break the habit of checking Craig's List a couple of times a week. While an Edison C-150 was definitely not on my short list, I saw one for $200 this morning and had to check it out. The cabinet needs a refinish, but it played well and had a 78 adopter reproducer as well as the regular Edison reproducer. Removed the grill and there was another Edison reproducer, which may have been there in its shipping cradle since new! (It would be interesting to know how that came to be!) All the reproducers play well, although the one for 78s needs new gaskets. And it came with 32 Diamond Disks and more than 50 78s, mostly batwings and VEs--all but 3 or 4 in good condion.

Needless to say at $200 it all came home with me (I didn't even haggle) and will be the next project. Will take some before and after pics and post them later.

Clay

My C-150 is my "every day" machine. I'm amazed at how quiet the motor is! Hope you enjoy yours!

A lot of the metal work and the finish on the C150 were in a pretty bad way, so I decided on this one, just as a one time experiment (it not being a particularly rare model), to do an about 95% full cosmetic restoration. I had the bad metal work cleaned and replated and sent the cabinet to the same guy who did the great job with my Credenza for a full brown mahogany shellac “piano” finish as I believe it would have had when it left the factory.

I went by this morning to see how he is coming with the cabinet and it is going to be just stunning. I now understand why so many people liked mahogany back in the day. The grain is gorgeous and just pops, something you would never know looking at it after decades of deterioration. What people bought a century ago and the way most look now are worlds apart.

It should be back to me next week and when it is all back together I will put up some before and after pics.

Clay

I look at local Craig's List to find 78's, but almost nothing ever turns up worth pursuing, for some reason. Just a lot of (frequently overpriced) junk.

There are some good deals on machines to be had it seems.

Wolfe wrote:I look at local Craig's List to find 78's, but almost nothing ever turns up worth pursuing, for some reason. Just a lot of (frequently overpriced) junk.

There are some good deals on machines to be had it seems.

Yes, just takes a lot of patience. There are some grains of wheat, but you have to sort them out from tons of chaff.

And sometimes it means going to sniff out the situation based on paltry clues if you have the time. Going to a garage sale last year that just mentioned in the CL ad that there was a phonograph in the lot resulted in picking up a beautiful VV-XVI in excellent condition for $250. Not long before that I picked up over 100 decent 78s for $7. Of course a similar jaunt resulted in someone who could not even think about taking less than $2,500 for grandma's ratty L-Door. She will have that one on her hands for a VERY long time. It is very much hit and miss.

Clay