EDISON PHONOGRAPHS
Thomas Alva Edison (1847 – 1931) patented his phonograph in 1878, but as he was also working on other inventions at the same time, he did not develop it until 1887. Our exhibit includes an Edison ‘Gem’ phonograph, produced from 1899. It was small and relatively cheap at £2.2s. but may still have been far too expensive for low wage earners.
The Edison ‘Fireside’ Phonograph Combination Type A on display has the serial number 6451, which probably indicates a production date of 1909. Previous models only played cylinder recordings lasting about two minutes, whereas this new model played both two-minute and four-minute ones.
The large, morning-glory shaped, metal horns amplified the sound – the larger the horn, the louder the potential volume. If a lower volume was wanted, some people would literally ‘put a sock in it’, supposedly the origin of the phrase.
Early recordings were imprinted on tinfoil over a grooved metal cylinder, but these could only be played a few times before they were worn out. Later recordings were made on brown wax cylinders, but production rates were very slow as recording artists would have to give the same performances many times over in front of several recording devices to make enough cylinders to sell. Eventual improvements culminated in the ‘Gold-Moulded’ process from 1902, using hard black wax cylinders that could be mass produced and played hundreds of times. Many thousands of recordings of popular pieces and vaudeville routines were made.
Thomas_Edison_Mary_had_lamb
On show are cardboard tubes containing two types of cylinders. One is an ‘Edison Gold Moulded’, 2-minute recording of the song ‘Just Plain Folks’ sung by the contralto comedienne, Ada Jones, made in 1905.* The second is an example of the longer-playing ‘Edison Amberol’ recordings that were made available from 1908. Our’s features a 4-minute selection from ‘Maritana’, an opera by W V Wallace, played by the Edison Concert Band, released in 1909.
n 1913, improved recordings on ‘Blue Amberol’ celluloid cylinders were marketed in the UK until imports of machines and records from the USA were banned during the First World War. They were made available again in 1919 until 1929, when production ceased.