A BETTER LIFE - The Collectors
Interview of Collectors
A BETTER LIFE - The Collectors
From Berliner to Victor: Early Disc Recordings: Part 3 of My Conversation with Jack Stanley
The scratchy, haunting sounds of early disc recordings transport us to a revolutionary moment in human history when voices and music could be captured and replayed at will. In this deep dive with collector and historian Jack Stanley, we unravel the forgotten story of how the disc record transformed entertainment forever.
While Edison's cylinder phonograph is often celebrated as the first recording device, the disc format that would eventually dominate the market emerged through a completely different technological path. Beginning with Berliner's gramophone and its primitive zinc discs, the industry rapidly evolved through technological innovation and fierce business competition.
Stanley guides us through the fascinating corporate chess game that unfolded between 1900-1910, revealing how companies like Victor, Columbia, and Zonophone battled for market supremacy. The stories are filled with unexpected twists - from Columbia accidentally selling their manufacturing capacity to their arch-rival, to the brilliant marketing strategies that elevated certain brands above others through prestigious opera recordings.
What makes this history so compelling is how modern it feels. The cutthroat competition, patent battles, and strategic partnerships mirror today's tech industry conflicts. We witness Eldridge Johnson's visionary understanding that premium content (in this case, recordings by the world's greatest opera singers like Caruso) could establish brand dominance regardless of technical differences between competitors.
The episode reveals how these early recording pioneers created both the technological foundations and the business models that would shape recorded sound throughout the 20th century. From the composition of the shellac discs themselves to the marketing strategies that sold them, these innovations established patterns that persisted for decades afterward.
Whether you're fascinated by vintage technology, business history, or simply curious about how we moved from Edison's first words to today's streaming services, this exploration of early disc recordings offers remarkable insights into a transformative period in media history.
The first words I spoke in the original pornograph, a little piece of practical poetry. Mary had a little lamb. Its feet were quite as slow, and everywhere that Mary went, the lamb was sure to go.
Speaker 3:Hello everybody and welcome back to A Better Life the Collectors, part three of our conversation with Jack Stanley. I apologize, I'm back to the original studio here. I had a little technical difficulty with all the sophisticated equipment something a wire went bad and I didn't feel like wasting Jack's time while I tried to figure it out. So here we are again. Today's topic is early recordings, correct?
Speaker 2:A disc recording.
Speaker 3:A disc recording. So the floor is yours. Start wherever you want to start.
Speaker 2:Okay, well, good to see you again. You move records. I put piles of records around here, digging through here, finding this, that and everything else. And the interesting thing about the disc record industry a lot of people don't realize how early it goes back. In fact, I just happened to see the Antique Phonograph magazine from the Phonograph Society, right, and guess who has the oldest record? Wyatt Wyatt.
Speaker 3:He told me he found that in an antique store for $5. Yeah. He said he thinks it's worth $50,000.
Speaker 2:Well, it's certainly worth a great deal, because there's nothing else like it. That's true, which is really amazing and you never know what you're going to find.
Speaker 2:You know it's still. It's still as many people want to say, it's long past, but it's not. There's lots of this stuff still being found. Uh, I think I I've I haven't talked about this, but it's probably the perfect place to talk about it is.
Speaker 2:I did an exhibit at a library on early disc recording. I did this in 1982, about 43 years ago, and I had a whole display of early disc recordings and I was relatively new in the hobby and stuff. And as soon as I did this I would get phone calls saying oh, we found all these records. Would you like them? And they would just. And I had this pile of records. A good deal of them were frank, sinatra and stuff like that.
Speaker 2:But there were, there were some fascinating early recordings and uh, and it was really interesting and of course they, they were going to throw them out and that's what that was the fate of most records, if you think about about it. They get tossed in the circular file and they're lost. But for me, from the start, it's always been a window of fascination for me to look at the disc record in its beginnings, because it is clearly overshadowed by the cylinder. The cylinder is. You know, when you think of early recording, when you think of the first recording, when you think of an old Thomas Edison phonograph, you think of a cylinder. Now, of course you have the diamond disc record, of course, which is a little bit later, but in 1900, the cylinder was king, right.
Speaker 3:It really was In America. But what about Canada? Or what about France? Were they Likewise?
Speaker 2:Same. Likewise. The reason is I mean, you had Columbia and you had Edison and they had branched out all over the world, right, and of course you had Pathé in France and they were setting up salons where you could sit down and request a song and put the earphones or the earpiece on and someone down in the cellars changing, you know, changing the cylinder and picking the music that you requested. So the cylinder was really top-notch, fidelity-wise, it was pretty good and of course it was always easy to pantographically make more. And of course you come up with Berliner.
Speaker 2:Berliner is the initial disc and today people think that's the only old, early disc. Actually, when you think about it. And the earliest of the Berliners were actually toys. They were in Europe and they were little tiny records. They were itsy-bitsy. Now I'm going to confess this is not original. This was made by Don Wilson and this is a record that belongs to a friend of mine. He has the record, I have the copy, but still, nonetheless, this is how they start. They were very tiny. I think the one that Wyatt got is like six inches rather than these. That are like about five or four and a half and five inches, but the size was standardized eventually to seven inches, and of course the speed was negotiable. There was really no set.
Speaker 3:I just happen to have one right here myself. This is A Little Wonder.
Speaker 2:A Little Wonder. Okay, those were made by Columbia.
Speaker 3:And this is another small one. They just happen to be sitting up here because I played them yesterday and this is a Victor Uncle Josh Weatherby's trip to Coney Island. I'm Victor and this is a seven inch. I think I have some other five inches, but they're over there. But I have a bunch of little ones, a bunch of set. Anytime anybody says, are you looking to buy records, I said do you have any seven or eight inches or anything small. I don't know why, but I always do.
Speaker 2:That makes sense because those are usually the earlier ones, right, little wonders are from the teens. Earlier ones, little Wonders are from the teens. But you know the Berliner and what we're going to talk about, the other companies as well. But let's just start with Berliner, because you know he's the fellow that develops the disc record and the ability to record on a blank made of zinc and it was covered with a fatty substance and you would record onto the fatty substance waxy kind of substance and then, after you made the recording, you would immerse the zinc disk in acid and the acid would eat into the fatty substance and cut into the zinc and that would be how you got your master record and you could actually play that. In fact it's an interesting thing and I'm jumping. I'm going to guess I'll be jumping all over the place here.
Speaker 2:Sorry about that, folks, but the thing about the Berliner system once the engineers recording engineers understood the process and had everything figured out, when they would make a recording they would play it back right away to see if it was any good, which was a wonderful feature, because which would happen later with wax recording you couldn't do that Right, and it was. You know it was up to the fates, if it recorded well, if everything came out right, and if not you had to do it all over again. So there was an advantage to that system, but being that it's immersed in acid and the acids eating in and creating those groups, it's a rough, rough, rough groove and of course, correspondingly, it made a lot of noise. But it was loud and that's what first got the attention is the fact that it was much louder than a brown wax cylinder and it was a lot tougher too. It held up pretty well. You know you look at some of the early cylinders. You know you look at them the wrong way. They crack on you.
Speaker 3:Right, and plus the storage is totally different, right yeah?
Speaker 2:You could basically put 50 Berliner records where you could put 10 cylinders. So now the thing is also, berliner gets into the business and I'm not going to go into all the history because that'll be about as exciting as a root canal to some people. So I will say it this way that Berliner becomes very, very successful because he is the only game in town and he starts picking up personnel to surround him and all of these people that he picks up to work with him become giants in the field. All the people that we will hear about for the next 30, 40 years after Berliner all had their start working with Berliner.
Speaker 3:It's funny. When I think of this, I think of industries computers, video games, all these industries that everybody said you're never going to make a living doing that. And then these people go out and make billions, right? And then some of the richest people in the world now right, and the similar thing, not that some of the richest people in the world now right and uh, and you know the similar thing. Not that they became the richest people in the world, but the early people, all separated, dominated the industry. Think about television. The same way, the early people controlled all the biggest radio station, uh, television and radio stations. So it's very interesting. I'm sorry, I digress.
Speaker 2:No, that's good. I like having a dialogue here. It makes it. It gives us new ideas and thoughts and things that are going on.
Speaker 3:I start listening to you and I forget I should speak a little bit, but I just forgot what I was saying before to you. You were talking about these people that Ollie wore with glitter in the beginning where they become the giants of this industry.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, and you will. I mean, think of Eldridge Johnson, think of Calvin Child, who probably a lot of people have no idea who he was, but Calvin Child was the head of the recording department for the Victor Talking Machine Company. Child was the head of the recording department for the Victor Talking Machine Company, very important and very much involved in creating a relationship between Victor and the Gramophone Company and a lot of the other folks that will be running what would become the Gramophone and Typewriter. All got their start with Berliner and we have to remember that that gramophone company in England was a Berliner company. Okay, just like Edison had his companies all over the place putting out brown wax and stuff like that, and Columbia, the same the Berliner company, did that. Now, of course, berliner becomes very, very popular in the United States because this is where it all starts, the Berliner business, and just to share with you and just to share with you, I'll pull these up, because he wanted to record people that made a difference, who were historic and things like that. This is a fascinating record and I don't know if it shows up well and I'll make copies of this, but it's good to hold it while I'm doing this right now and I'll make copies of this, but it's good to hold it while I'm doing this right now.
Speaker 2:This is a recording of the chief trumpeter of Theodore Roosevelt's Rough Riders. Wow, and he's recording for Berliner. He made several recordings. There were parts one, two and three. I believe possibly four, and it's history on zinc, as it were, and these are the same sounds as you heard in Cuba and so for the first time people were listening and saying you know, you are there, you know, you are there. Pretty amazing Buffalo Bill Cody made a Berliner, and Chauncey DePue, who people don't realize who he is, but he was probably one of the most influential politicians who had basically connections with people as far back as Abraham Lincoln and all the way up to Calvin Coolidge.
Speaker 2:I mean, think about that spread. That's pretty incredible. But he made Berliner recordings. A lot of people did and the Berliner became a very, very popular option once Eldridge Johnson got into the mix and developed the machine that would play them with a spring. Very important, the spring-driven gramophone. Because if you look at the early Berliner stuff, grandma phone, because if you look at the early Berliner stuff, it was like an egg beater, you know, you had to sit there and turn it and you never got it quite right. And who are you going to get to do it next? I mean after about three times? You know, uncle Harry was tired. I'm not turning that damn thing again, you know, and someone else would have to take over.
Speaker 3:Get little Johnny to sit over there.
Speaker 2:As I mentioned to you, last time we talked, I was meeting with Walter Cronkite. He told me that his parents both had wind-up machines, but he was the one that did the winding All of them and so the Berliner Gramophone became a big, big deal, becomes extremely successful and, like any business that becomes extremely successful, lots of people try to bring it down, and if there ever is an opportunity to create a miniseries, the early recording industry would be incredible because there was so much intrigue, so much dirty business so much backstabbing, it's so incestuous.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, and the interesting thing is there was a number of people who were involved with Berliner who went off on their own and tried to destroy Berliner, and I will talk about one of them in a short while. But one of the things that's really important is that the company starts to fall apart and, as I said, I'll go into this in the future. It starts to fall apart. There is battles, there are patent disputes. We have this magnificent lawyer that I told you about, philip Morrow, who took a Berliner disc and was able to use a cylinder machine patent to put Berliner out of business. Think about that. That's like trying to get a 747 off the air by using a Ford tri-motor. It's apples and oranges. But the patent was for a needle moved by a groove and therefore every record, if you think about it, was in violation of that patent. But it was used specifically just for Berliner to put them out of business, and it did, and by 1900, it was all over for Berliner. So we collect the records.
Speaker 2:A lot of people have amazing collections. I used to have a lot of Berliner records. I don't have that many anymore. I've been slowly getting rid of some of them and stuff like that and just keeping a handful of them. You know I'll never have them all.
Speaker 3:I don't know that much about berliner, that much about the machines, I mean, other than what I read in like uh tim's book. You know phonographs. There's a little blurbs in there about Berliners. I don't know that much about Berliners and I don't know much about the recordings and I have none of the records.
Speaker 2:Okay. You will I know, you have everything else.
Speaker 3:I have a lot of other stuff.
Speaker 2:I don't have everything else I see all this stuff, I'm like going holy cow cow.
Speaker 3:How did you get all this stuff? I you know you make friends with people that sell machines, you know so I don't. I don't have that much, but I don't have any belinters. I mean, there's a lot of things I'd like to get my hands on, and certainly a belinner I I don't know which. Like, if I was going to get one, which one would it be? And I see them, them. And then there's Canadians and American models, and I don't know that much about it and I know I'll buy the wrong one.
Speaker 2:Well, make sure you talk to like Wyatt or any major collector who has some of the early stuff or has experience with it. Just don't buy it. They also made replicas, I know and so you have to be careful with that too.
Speaker 2:And one thing you have to remember Berliner records don't sound good. They're as I mentioned, they're zinc. You know, they're noisy. It's more the historic value. In fact I would say probably 95% is the historic value and 5% is the value that what's on it. I mean people just love to know that this is a record that was made in the 1890s. I mean, if you think about it, that's pretty awe record that was made in the 1890s. I mean, if you think about it, that's pretty awe-inspiring when you think about it. Sure, pretty amazing. So that's a good start with Berliner. Let's put Emil to the side for a little bit.
Speaker 2:And there was a fellow working for Berliner whose name was Frank Seaman. Frank Seaman was a phenomenal points man. He was great at advertising. He signed a contract I think it was in 1896 with Berliner to market the machines. And through Seaman's work the Berliner company just exploded. It was just so successful. And Seaman went to Berliner and said I think I need a better cut, a better deal. Went to Berliner and said I think I need a better cut, a better deal. Now Berliner more or less said a deal's a deal. He signed a contract.
Speaker 2:Well, that didn't go over too well with Seaman and he was working with some other people and eventually develops the Universal Talking Machine Company, which today would produce what we call the Zonophone record, eventually replaces the Berliner gramophone through a little skullduggery and also because of Columbia wanting to get rid of Berliner, because they were terrified of Berliner, they wanted to get rid of Berliner and they weren't scared of semen. And they kind of actually, if I recall correctly, I think for a short while, a very short while, the Columbia Phonograph Company was marketing the Zono phone record. For a short while. That was until they decided to finally get into the business, which is another story in itself. But let's just take a look at some Zonophone stuff real quick. Zonophone is a fascinating thing. The Universal Talking Machine Company, as it was called as I dig through here, pardon me, I made piles of this, that and everything else and the earliest, the earliest of those records have no information whatsoever.
Speaker 3:Try to look them up on even the database. That, what is it? Santa Barbara, Santa, whatever has?
Speaker 2:You don't find them. No, they're very. These, this is the rarer ones. Yeah, I don't have those Are the ones without any kind of information. Now, these are not pirates. They are actually made by the company in 1900. But there were so many battles going on in 1900. I mean, everybody was suing everybody, and of course, frank Seaman. As soon as he got rid of Berliner, which is what in April or May of 1900?, which is right around when these things come out Once Berliner's out of the fray, which is right around when these things come out, once Berliner's out of the fray, eldridge Johnson pops up and he's attacked by semen and he is brought into court constantly, which we'll get into and, needless to say, the three of them were pretty much partners, whether at least contractually partners, in the beginning.
Speaker 3:right, and they all handled three different ends of the business. Yeah, they did. Maybe you could just move a little bit towards. Which way, this way there you go. There, you go Okay.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yes, I noticed when we did the other things. I'm like halfway out of the thing.
Speaker 3:Right, I mean that doesn't mean that it doesn't pick up more of that and center you, because I'll do that Maybe in the first one. In the second one you won't have that, but anyway, yeah, see, this is the story I found very interesting. Some of the reason is because I have some Zono phones, but those I think are later. They're the concert models. I think those are later, when Victor was more in the fray. They're not the A, b and C early one. You're talking about the machines.
Speaker 2:Yes, okay, yeah, zona Phone was its own company for a short while and really gave the gramophone and typewriter company a run for their money. They were very aggressive and it's surprising how everything kind of fell apart, but for just a short few years, zonophone I mean, they even did a recording session with Caduceus, you know, and which is pretty amazing. I mean, g&t did it first, but then Zonophone did it and did a better job. They're not as haphazard as the first Cadarosa recordings, which is a fun story which I'll get into another time.
Speaker 2:But getting back to the Zono phone or the universal talking machine, there's nothing here, just absolutely blank Violin. Yeah, it's nothing here, just absolutely blank Violin. Yeah, it's a violin. And it does say who it is. It's the fellow who's in charge of the recording department, fred W Hager, and Hager would have his band, he'd have his orchestra, he would do solos, he would do everything at Xonophone and for a number of years he was a major player on Columbia on Xonophone, even on Victor. Now, let me get a few more of these together here so you can see them.
Speaker 3:Now let me get a few more of these together here so you can see them.
Speaker 2:There's all different types. Now, this is a pirated what we call a pirated Xenophon.
Speaker 3:So does that mean by pirated?
Speaker 2:does that mean somebody copied it at the time or somebody copied it later on? Copied it at the time?
Speaker 3:Naughty, naughty.
Speaker 2:As we would call it today, bootleg. Yeah, and there are arguments on both sides that you know Seaman was busy and the gramophone company, or I should say the advertising company, was run by Seaman and there had been lots of money charged on all different sides and everybody had a little part, as you kind of mentioned. And so some people will say, well, they had every right to use them. But this is different. Most of the pirated from domestic recordings. This is taken from a European gramophone disc, which is really kind of fascinating when you think about it. In fact, this is what that record should have looked like. This is a similar recording made a couple of recordings later, but basically this is how that would have looked. All of that's been scrubbed away and you end up with People used to copy videotapes.
Speaker 3:They used to neglect to copy the FBI warning that you can't duplicate it. Same kind of thing, but they used to neglect to copy the. Fbi warning that you can't duplicate it. You know, yeah, same kind of thing. But so those are Xonophone records, or they say Universal.
Speaker 2:Talking Machine. They're Universal. The name Xonophone wasn't used very often early on, but I did find one that's very early, in which it's a Universal Talking Machine Company record but the Zonophone Orchestra is playing, which is kind of interesting. This is very hard to see and probably unseeable. Yeah, I can't see that and it's kind of rough, but I'll read it to you. It's a Universal Talking Machine record and it's played by the Zonophone Orchestra 1900, quite early. Who was it? Who knows? Right, you know, and that's the problem, there are no records paper records, I mean of what took place. We don't know, was it Hager's, maybe Was it some band in New York, maybe, whatever, and that's kind of. It's the earliest reference I have ever found talking about the Zonophone orchestra for the Universal Talking Machine Company and we'll make a copy of this thing so you can see it better. This is a cleaner one. This one's like new, beautiful. It still has like a shine to it yeah, it is just those hard to find.
Speaker 2:You can find them beat up to hell, but to find them in really good condition is very difficult. And once again, as I said, there's just tons of these things with just no title, no company, and on the back, here let me show, let me find one here to show you as I dig here. This is a, this is another one here. No company identification, on the back, no, nothing. You won't know what the hell it is. Some of the other ones, of course, like this violin one. It doesn't have any kind of information on the front, but on the back it does. It mentions it's the Universal Talking Machine Company, but that early one, which is by W Paris Chambers, by the way, very, very famous coronetist, has no information whatsoever.
Speaker 3:How is the sound of those? They're better than.
Speaker 2:Berliner and the recording engineer. We know his name, his name was Mr English and Mr English of course got his start with Berliner and would be involved with the Victor Company too. But he was really really good. He was quite a recording engineer and I have to say when you listen to some of the early victors or consolidated talking machine company records and compare them to the Zono phone or the universal talking machine company, there's a clear difference. There's a clear difference of quality. So unfortunately the Universal Talking Machine Company didn't fare too well for too long and by 1903, it's pretty much all over the Gramophone and Typewriter Company purchases most of the stampers and everything and assets of Zonophone and Eldridge Johnson on his own purchases the cheap side of Zonophone, the domestic kind of popular stuff, and those were all made. It's an interesting thing.
Speaker 2:I did a lot of research into this and for a long, long time it was said that records that were marked with a D on them you'll see it quite often on Victor records you will see in the dead wax a D and some people would sit there and say that's part of a recording machine that was used and looking at that recording machine, that recording machine didn't start getting used until around 1905, 1906. So if you found a recording from 1903, it's a big problem. So it's not that recording machine and so my theory was it was a marking for a company and it was. It's a company called. And it was. It's a company called Duranoid. Duranoid made chess pieces and plastic things and this, that, and they would make discs for Victor. And what's even more important and hardly ever recognized, is that the makeup of the 78 record, the material, was devised by Doronoid and that's very important. That building still exists in Newark, new Jersey, and I've often thought that there should be a historic plaque there because basically, the 78 record was invented there.
Speaker 2:Shellac 78 yeah that shellac and it's a mixture of all kinds of fun stuff. You know, I think originally it had pieces of rope in it and stuff. You know it's got a Whitman sampler of various ingredients, but that was far better than the hard rubber that Berliner was using which would flatten out in areas. And so that composition devised by Dourinoyd, basically, with changes of course, advancements, improvements would be the basic material used until like 1950. Right, you know, and that's pretty profound as far as I'm concerned. And so Doronoid stamped all of the records it made. And so if you look at an American zoonophone, american Xenophone, 1904 to like 1909, maybe 1910, it will have a prominent D in the dead wax stating it's pressed by Doronoid On early Victor records, on all of their personality records, all the Patty records, all the Melba records, all the Tomanio recordings, except for a few in Tomanio for Victor they're marked with the D.
Speaker 2:They were extremely busy and when Victor had the fire which destroyed their printing devices for their records, a Doranoid picked up the business and eventually the Victor Talking Machine Company purchased the Doranoid company and just took it, very much like Columbia would do with another company that I will talk about shortly. Now, once again, people will probably say but you did mention this that I'm not mentioning everything, I'm just doing little bits and pieces. So I apologize if I haven't covered everything. Talked about this, that and everything else, but we'd be here till next Sunday if we do that.
Speaker 2:Now, another early disc record that we see that really comes with a fascinating story is the Climax record, and the Climax record was Columbia's attempt to get into the disc industry, attempt to get into the disc industry. Now, as I mentioned to you before, for a short while they were marketing the Zonophone, the universal talking machine company, because they were the only legal disc record to be made, which was not saying much because they had no patents. But unfortunately Berliner had been put out of business because of the patent for the cylinder machine. So in theory every disk record was illegal, except for Zonafone, which they said it's okay. Now, it was okay until Columbia decided to make their own disc record and then they booted Zonophone the hell out of the whole industry Right, and were responsible in many regards to their destruction.
Speaker 3:Columbia made fantastic disc machines. I think the Columbia reproducers on their discs are better than the Victor's or anything for a 78.
Speaker 2:Columbia has gotten a bad rap in many respects. We've often been told their machines are crappy and this, that and everything else. You know, Victor, machines weren't so great either at times.
Speaker 3:Well, I thought the Columbia reproducers are great. I mean, I have a BI, sounds beautiful, a BNW.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they're wonderful things. And the thing about Columbia they were always willing to try something new, constantly trying to reinvent the wheel, as it were, whereas Victor was somewhat steady in its move. Whereas Victor was somewhat steady in its move, victor was much more concerned with creating an image, with creating an ideal that this was the greatest company ever created for sound recording. And they achieved that image. I mean, they were very smart on something and I'll get into that. But let me go to climax real quick. There was a company called the Burt Company which was in New Jersey as well. Busy place, new Jersey, in the recording industry.
Speaker 3:In a lot of industries, but certainly recording.
Speaker 2:Recording is. Years ago I tried getting to change the license plates for New Jersey. I said why don't you call it the birthplace of recorded sound? I said that would be kind of cool. You know North.
Speaker 2:Carolina is the birthplace of flight. Granted, you have the phone autograph, but that was never designed to play back. Now, getting to climax, you have that Burt Company which is down in the I'm trying to remember the area that it's in, but it's kind of like in central New Jersey and they worked out a deal with the Columbia Company and that is to make records. Now the problem was they didn't want to get sued, so they created another company under the umbrella of the Burt Company called the Globe Record Company, and Globe would manufacture Climax Records. Now, initially it didn't say Columbia on it, it was just an embossed label. But that changed pretty quick and before long Columbia was on the label.
Speaker 2:Now, once again, they had no patents. Nobody had any patents. The only patents that anyone had was Berliner. He had tons of patents on disc records, but he was kind of like on the sidelines, you know, shaking his fist at everybody. And so Climax comes out and their records are, let me pull out. So Climax comes out and their records are let me pull out a Climax here. It's like playing cards here. Of course it's the last record in the pile.
Speaker 3:Isn't it always the truth?
Speaker 2:Yeah, now't it always the truth? Yeah, now, one of the things that's very interesting about this where the bloody hell did the climax? Now, this is a later climax, but this is fine. This is a 1902 climax disc, just before they stopped making them. They were only made in the years of 1901 and 1902. And you'll see the Globe Record Company stuff here which we can do pictures of and stuff like that. Absolutely, I know there's a climax in here, but nonetheless the Globe Record Company started making their discs and they were it's the amazing disappearing climax record Very much like they were with everyone else. Nobody knew about them and they had a tendency of hiding. Their records were sold by Columbia. It was kind of an unusual setup. They were recorded in studios in New York and the same studio was used to record Zonophone stuff, which was kind of interesting. And of course, who do we have in there, mr English? For?
Speaker 3:a little while until he leaves.
Speaker 2:You go with the best right. Yeah, he leaves pretty soon and joins some other concerns, but the climax record has a lot of issues here.
Speaker 3:And.
Speaker 2:I'm going to find this part of my French this damn thing.
Speaker 3:Well, you saw my Xenophone records and they're older, right? They're with labels, and I have a bunch of like the ones I posted on YouTube. Hold on just for one second.
Speaker 2:Yeah, sure, it always helps to bring it along. I left it on the table. Now this is the early climax, right, this is from 1901. Now before that time they took the embossed records and put a label over the embossed stuff, which is interesting. And of course there are a few people who are very fortunate that have the embossed only labels, which is phenomenal. That's something I'd love to have someday but I don't think I ever will. They're so hard to find.
Speaker 2:And while this was all going on and the production of 7-inch and later 10-inch although there was a 10-inch issued right at the beginning which might have been just for display purposes or for sales purposes Eventually Eldridge Johnson who's been looking in the wings and watching what's going on, you know sits there and says you know, like this is getting ridiculous here. This is like open season on just doing something completely illegal. So on October the 3rd 1901, berliner and Johnson joined forces and create the Victor Talking Machine Company. Basically they used the name Victor company. Basically they used the name Victor. He was the consolidated talking machine company, but he was the Victor in the court case, right.
Speaker 2:And with that partnership, eldridge Johnson now has command of a lot of patents and he kind of looks over at the climax and says no, no, no, no, you can't do this. Well, they do it anyway. But what Johnson doesn't know is that Columbia and that magnificent lawyer, philip Morrow, who everybody should have hired. As far as I'm concerned, there was a fellow named Joseph Jones who had worked for Berliner and worked with Johnson and knew about Johnson's wax process, but Johnson didn't Johnson's wax process, but Johnson didn't patent his wax process.
Speaker 2:His lawyer said don't do it because you'll give the recipe away. Well, nonetheless, joseph Jones applies for a wax recording patent. It's rejected. Puts it in again Rejected. At that point they push him to the side, bring up Philip Morrow and Philip Morrow rewrites it and it's accepted On December the 10th 1901,. This is where things really start going. Wacko, I'm sure, because now we have a situation here Columbia cannot make disc records because Johnson has the Berliner patent on the disc record, but Johnson can't make wax recordings because Columbia has the Jones patent. What do you do?
Speaker 3:You buy everybody.
Speaker 2:So. So of course they're both. Once again, this would be the most fascinating kind of mini series or movie. You know they're both shaking their fists at each other, but neither can do anything without the other.
Speaker 3:So they both have to hold their nose. Right Today's world. You would just buy a license to use the.
Speaker 2:Right, they both hold their nose and decide to pull their patents. Right, they both hold their nose and decide to pull their patents. Therefore, they could both do what they're doing, because neither could do what they were doing without the other. It's really fascinating. And there's a lot more to this. There's a lot more to this. There's a lot more to this. But of course, now, after the Jones patent comes in the Columbia gang they're happy as hell. They're partying. Let's bring out the champagne, screw Johnson, we've got the patent, and they're really kind of happy.
Speaker 2:And in their hangover stage, eldridge Johnson goes to the Burt Company and it turns out that Columbia is very, very tardy In paying their rent To the Globe Record Company. So Johnson says Hello, burt Company, rent to the Globe Record Company. So Johnson says hello, burt Company, I got lots of money, I'd like to buy the Globe Record Company, and so he buys it for $10,000. Now the Columbia Group gets back after their big celebration and hangover most probably and discover that the company that's making their records is owned by Johnson. It's a problem.
Speaker 2:This is fun stuff and what Johnson does, and we'll just hear this in pictures. But there's something here that you probably can't catch here, like a little what in Disha or something. It's a little circle here and, as I said, we'll take pictures. It's just not going to come through very well here. And this little circle has something very fascinating Eldridge Johnson. Since he owns the Globe Record Company, he has access to all the stampers for the Climax Record Company Right, and so he takes every climax disc. This might show up much better. No, I could see it. There's a little circle there yeah, I see it it says vtm.
Speaker 2:Every Columbia record that's the climax label advertises the Victor talking machine.
Speaker 2:An absolute fit of near epileptic trouble takes place within the Columbia Company. Edward Easton, who ran it, immediately starts negotiations with Johnson to get the company back. And Johnson doesn't want the company. He's just doing it to get under their skin and it does. I mean, it drives them freaking crazy. And so they buy it back. But Johnson's already made his point that he had a much stronger control on various patents than Columbia, even though they had pulled a few. And so at that point the Climax record stops and then the Columbia record comes out, and for years afterwards until like maybe 1904, you will find Columbia discs with that round circle saying VTM on it. Now what I can't figure out is why didn't they just tool it out? Wouldn't be that difficult to do, but they didn't do it, they didn't care.
Speaker 3:Maybe you couldn't do it legally. Maybe I don't know why they just didn't put the logo.
Speaker 2:Yeah, this is one. This is a Columbia disc and it's got the circle. Now, of course, as I've alluded to an awful lot and talked an awful lot about, and that's Eldridge Johnson. And Eldridge Johnson, of course, is the inventor of the wax recording process and he gets into the business not because he wants to, but because of Philip Morrow and Columbia putting Berliner out of business because Eldridge Johnson is making all the machines. He's making a lot of the parts, he's doing experimentation on various things for Berliner.
Speaker 2:And so what happens as I dig through here, pardon me what happens is that Johnson is forced into the industry. He has no desire to be in the industry, he likes being in the background. That will be his motus operandi for the rest of his career with Victor. He never wants to be in the front, he likes to be in the background. And eventually, when he finally does sell Victor off in 1926, he's happy as can be but later regrets it. So what Johnson has to do is come up with a record and he had been doing his experiments and he develops what's called the Consolidated Talking Machine Company of Philadelphia.
Speaker 3:Finally out of New Jersey, Of course.
Speaker 2:Philadelphia. Yes, we're out of New Jersey just for a little bit.
Speaker 3:I mean it's only right across the water from Camden.
Speaker 2:And this is their label. This is very scarce A consolidated talking machine company for about two months.
Speaker 3:They love the Sousa's band right.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, Sousa was everywhere except in the recording studio, Right.
Speaker 3:That's why it says band.
Speaker 2:Yeah, now of course this has a little sign in the back and what it says on the back is and it's a little condescending it says here this record is leased for the purpose of producing sound directly from the record Makes sense, and for no other purpose. Any attempt at copying or counterfeiting will be construed as a violation of this condition and a basis for legal proceedings. Another thing that they would have on these records saying this record is very good or near perfect and if it does not play well, it's the fault of your machine, not the record. I've got one of those with that thing on the back on it too. I'll pull it out. And so Eldridge Johnson starts that whole thing. Eventually he gets involved with Berliner, as I mentioned, and they take as their logo that little portrait, which was the gramophone portrait. Actually, it's all devised by the gramophone company actually.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but the portrait was originally Edison.
Speaker 2:Right, the portrait was originally an Edison bell cylinder machine, but the wisdom of the office in England is very, very important. The fellow that was in charge the manager, I think his name is Barry Owen, barry Owen or Barry Owens. The artist, francis Berard, I believe his name was had this portrait of a little dog looking into the Edison bill phonograph and he wanted to borrow a horn to update the picture a little bit. What Hold on?
Speaker 3:I was trying to tighten it and it didn't really work. Coming up, boy, technical difficulties beyond belief, that I coming on, boy technical difficulties beyond belief.
Speaker 2:yes, so we're back, getting back to where we were. Barry Owens says to the artist what's the picture of? He says it's a little dog looking into an Edison Bell phonograph. And in a moment of sheer brilliance Owens says I'll tell you what Paint our latest machine in the picture and we'll buy it. Of course Rod couldn't sell the damn thing Right, and so he's happy as can be and he goes to work on it. It's interesting to note the original portrait, which is in England, has a shadow of that Edison Bell cylinder machine in it and Nipper's looking into a machine he never saw. But the interesting thing, barry Owen, that's absolutely brilliant.
Speaker 2:He was one of these individuals who came up with brilliant ideas and absolutely freaking stupid ideas at the same time. Sometimes he had, sometimes it was live ammunition, sometimes it wasn't. That was his brilliant moment. His absolutely stupid moment took place a year later, or two years later, I should say. He said the bubble is going to burst. How long can we keep selling these records? It's not going to work. It's not as you were saying before with the computer stuff. And so what he does is invest a good deal of the capital of the gramophone company into something called the Lambert Typewriter, which is the biggest piece of crap I ever saw. When it came to a typewriter, it had one key and you turned a dial.
Speaker 3:Crazy.
Speaker 2:It made the Titanic look like a success story. I mean, it was terrible. And they invested their money and of course changed the name, you know, to the Gramophone and Typewriter Company. Well, I think it's well said in the fabulous phonograph by Roland Gillette he mentions that after that happened Barry Owen was gone. The interesting thing about the English office of the gramophone they're all American. So there was a decidedly American accent in the European G&T office, which is kind of fascinating. And for a number of years it's the gramophone and typewriter company until they're finally able to get out of that mess and become the gramophone, his master's voice. But it's a fascinating thing that the guy who came up with that whole idea of Nipper looking into the machine that was one time when the ammunition was loaded and it was a brilliant idea. But he ended up his days in Martha's Vineyard raising chickens, according to Roland Gillette.
Speaker 3:I wouldn't mind ending up there myself raising chicken.
Speaker 2:So that's some of the early, early records. Those are the major players. If you think about it, you had the Consolidated, later the Victor, you had the Climax, later Columbia, and then you had the Universal Talking Machine, later Zonophone. Now Columbia's mishaps don't stop with the Jones situation and losing the Globe Record Company. I want to show you something. Barry Owen once again brilliant, brilliant, brilliant. When he's brilliant, he's brilliant, and when he's not, he ain't. I want to show you some of the stuff that they did.
Speaker 2:One of the greatest coups was getting the greatest carmen in the world, madame Calvet, to make records for the gramophone company, for the gramophone and typewriter. This is the first edition recording of it from 1902. I think it's July of 1902, if I'm not mistaken. And what's really amazing is that she was beloved around the world and well-known, very famous, perhaps one of the most famous opera singers in the world. And through connections of the pianist and a great deal of pleading and money from the Gramophone and Typewriter Company, she agreed to make a record.
Speaker 2:And what happened in that recording session is nothing short of a disaster. They go to pick her up and her entourage, of course, in a carriage and she's all dolled up and everybody's there kissing her ass to a white heat, as it were. And they work their way to the recording studio, which wasn't exactly a pretty place. She took one look and said this is a tavern, this is a dirty place. You're bringing me to be attacked. And she goes off in full diva mode okay, screaming, shouting, ok, screaming, shouting, saying that her life was in danger, et cetera, et cetera. At that point Everybody is trying to figure out what to do. The pianist gets up Charges faster than a rocket up the stairs to the office. He finds the best looking guy in the office and hands him the check and says go down there and be handsome. And so he goes down and she's carrying on. And there he goes in his suave style and answer her check and she's like, ooh.
Speaker 2:Boy some things in business haven't changed.
Speaker 2:And suddenly everything is fine and he walks arm in arm with her into the recording studio and she doesn't notice a thing. She is just absolutely mesmerized by this young fella. So that gets done. But we're not done with the problems. They get into the studio and they start recording.
Speaker 2:She decides to dance while recording. That's a no-no, not with acoustic recording. You've got to stay focused on that horn. And she's dancing around and then halfway through she's saying how do I sound? And so they have to stop everything and they tell her no dancing, no talking sing.
Speaker 2:So they do it again and she starts going into the wild diva mode again and then she starts screaming, hollering and shouting. They start recording. And then she starts screaming, hollering and shouting. They start recording. She lets out with a few glees of sadness and happiness and stuff during the recording and then finally get that done. Then she does another one where she just starts screaming at the end of the record because she hit a wrong note. She recorded it again, sang the same note wrong again and they just issued it. Recorded it again, sang the same note wrong again and they just issued it. The whole recording staff after this event aged about 15 years. Okay, I mean they were totally wiped out. And when they were cleaning up the studio, after it was all done and over, they found her check rolled up in a ball sitting on the floor.
Speaker 3:She just threw it out.
Speaker 2:I don't think she even realized it, so they had to send it to her. She was excited about the young gentleman that helped her and she made some very fascinating recordings, and those first recordings are amazing to listen to because he's all over the place. Now this is really important and once again Mr Owens is very responsible for a lot of that. Doing high class recording which the opera singer, you know, in the beginning of the 20th century was like movie stars today. Everybody wanted to know everything that they were doing and newspapers were constantly writing about them and their pictures were taken all the time, and so they focused on these very, very important people. Now here is something quite fascinating as well.
Speaker 2:Not only did they do opera singers, but they went to the Vatican and they recorded the Vatican choir in the Sistine Chapel, including the voice of the Las Castrate, which I think everybody knows. What a castrate is? They remove parts of the individual's body so they never go into their voice, never goes into puberty. They're castrated, basically, and so the only recordings ever made of a castrate is done by the Gramophone and Typewriter Company. Amazing coup, amazing. And another great coup although they didn't realize it at the time was getting the voice of Caruso and this is one of his 1902 recordings and they were very, very popular and they had to make copies, and it's another story altogether. We could probably sit down and talk about Caruso sometime. I don't want to spend too much time, but here's the interesting thing.
Speaker 3:But those recordings I don't know if they call them matrixes or whatever they call them so are those the same recordings that are used over and over and over again on Caruso recordings, or are they new recordings?
Speaker 2:You mean the stampers?
Speaker 3:I know with Edison you get that a lot, where there's a recording made and you'll find it on a cylinder and on a diamond disc and in different places. Do you find that in Victor too, or no?
Speaker 2:Well, there is something that did take place which I don't know is the answer to your question. Gramophone Company in 1901, I believe, paid $10,000 for the rights to Johnson's wax process. He got smarter, okay.
Speaker 3:Sounds it.
Speaker 2:He got smarter okay, sounds it and so that process had limitations. When you record it in wax, you were able to make one stamper, basically one major stamper, I think sometimes you can make two, but nothing much more than that. You. You couldn't make multiple stampers and that led to a big problem. The only way you could do it is record it again, and that wasn't going to happen. A lot of times it was just too expensive. That wasn't going to happen. A lot of times it was just too expensive. So what they started doing was, once again, here's a marking on a record that I don't know it's going to be seen, but you'll see a little CO there. I see it, yeah, and that says copy. And the copy was basically they took that worn stamper and repeated the process all over again onto wax and then they could make another stamper from that wax. But it has all the inherent wear of that first stamper from that wax. But it has all the inherent wear of that first stamper, which was an issue with these first Carusos. He made 10, and that recording session's crazy, which we'll talk about another time. But those 10 records I think seven of them were salvageable to make copies from and the quality is okay, but certainly secondary to the first pressings.
Speaker 2:Now this is another interesting little thing, so people will see this. This is a gramophone and typewriter Caruso. This was made at the end of 1902, this recording Now. What's very fascinating about it is that there was a deal made by Johnson and by Calvin Child to have a lend-lease program, you might say, of stampers between the Gramophone and Typewriter and the Victor Talking Machine Company, and in the early days it was very much in Victor's benefit because all we had were bands and coonsongs and things like that. And so we started something in the United States by Victor, something called the 5000 Series. They're very rare. They were on the market for six months and they cost $2.50 each in 1903. Wow.
Speaker 2:That's a hell of a lot of money, and as soon as that came out, they changed everything around again and changed the whole system. This is the same record but a different number. Now it's 91,000. I think it's 91. Yeah 91.
Speaker 2:And these 250 again, but these have the little mark saying imported on top Right. It's kind of a fascinating thing because Columbia tried the same thing. But Columbia, as it seems to be their custom, they found ways of screwing things up. This is much rarer than the 5000 series. This is the Columbia Operatic Disc Record. This just says Columbia Disc Record. This is their first label. Eventually it would be the Grand Opera Disc Record.
Speaker 2:These were made by Columbia to beat Victor to the punch with the 5000 series. So what they did? They got gobs of money and found operatic singers and just threw money at them and said let's make some records. And so they got a whole mess of singers from the Metropolitan Opera in New York some records. And so they got a whole mess of singers from the Metropolitan Opera in New York and in the space of about two months they made something like 30, 40 recordings. Wow, for probably what would equal out in today's money around a million dollars. They charged $2 for each record.
Speaker 2:They were not done in the best of quality. They had that archaic announcement in the beginning, Columbia, which made it sound so old-fashioned, and Prince was the pianist, and the quality was okay. Some of them were great. Some of them are very Columbia-like. But the thing is Edward Easton who's in charge of the company a little bit like our friend in G&T who developed that whole thing with Nipper and stuff he decides they're not doing well, so he cancels the whole project. All that money Lost, all that money lost because Edward Easton didn't see a complete turnaround in the money from those records.
Speaker 2:You're not going to get the turnaround. You've got to remember something it's so vitally important in the early recording industry and this is what Eldridge Johnson understood right from the get-go that I'm going to get the greatest artists. Their records will never sell great amounts, but the prestige will be incredible. You will have Caruso making Victor records considered the greatest operatic tenor in the world. Well, if the greatest operatic tenor in the world records for Victor, then it must be the same for this orchestra, it must be the same for this violinist, it must be the same for this jazz group". Because all of a sudden Victor had created snob appeal and that snob appeal worked. People were willing to pay a small fortune for records. They were charging three3 for a Caruso record. I mean, think about that. And then of course they had the MoBA and the Paddy records. They were $5 each and eventually the Luchia Sextet was $7. You know, I told you about that before the translation. What restrains me? $7, you know. But all of this happened Machines.
Speaker 3:you could buy machines for $7 and $10 during that period.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you could buy really cheap ones, but the thing is that's so much money and you've got to think how much that money is. You know, you could have a nice meal at Delmonico's in New York City for like two or three dollars, a really fancy meal, and so here we are, paying the same thing that you pay for a really top-notch dinner at Delmonico's for a record that plays three minutes. It's really amazing In this early recording industry there's so many facets, so many different avenues, so many different battles. I'm just touching little pieces of this. As I said, you could get a group of people which would be a lot of fun to get a group of us all together and toss stories back and forth at each other and remind ourselves of all the stuff that we forgot, and that would be an absolute hoot because there is just so much to this. It's one of the most unique stories in the history of entertainment is the early recording industry.
Speaker 3:It's really well. You're at the time of the robber barons, right? They're some of the richest people in the world. They're working on the backs of others, and you're also at a time when, uh, large amounts of wealth, um, you know, some would say, you know the rise of the bourgeoisie, or whatever you want to call it in america, where, capitalism right where, where the middle class emerges because they're factory workers, the emerging of the unions, and and and and uh labor, I should say. And there's this middle class with money to spend, right, sure.
Speaker 2:And they find different places for you to spend it Correct. Yeah, it's a perfect storm.
Speaker 3:And Victor.
Speaker 2:I think Victor is the greatest example of that. I mean Edison does People keep saying things like Edison was kind of behind and whatever. And Victor, I think Victor is the greatest example of that. I mean Edison does People keep telling, saying things like Edison was kind of behind and whatever. Edison was doing very well. They were, they were they were doing very well with the cylinder and the cylinder was holding its own until you know, like around 1907, 1908. They had to apologize. They used to put out these public apologies saying they were three months behind in production because the sales were so great.
Speaker 3:Well, there's certainly lots of cylinders out there, so somebody must have bought them right. They're everywhere. I buy boxes of it at auctions, you know and some of them are junk and some of them are good.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I, like you know I always I collect the classical cylinders. I'm fascinated by that. Hard to find, they're not very common because not many people bought them and they're also more expensive. Of course, you know, columbia tried doing the same thing, columbia and and I think this should be for another show we could sit and talk about this um, because columbia and victor start having different, various battles over bringing out the big names and using different labels and different companies, especially with Columbia. Columbia would try. Anybody.
Speaker 3:Well, you see the ads, you know the ads of their. They sign these exclusive recording contracts. And you see the ads where they advertise we have Caruso, nobody else has Caruso, or we have someone else, john McCormick, or McCormick is that what you're saying?
Speaker 2:Yeah, john McCormick. John McCormick made actually he sold more records than Caruso. Caruso sold a lot of records and a lot of. It was basically whenever you bought a machine and I wouldn't be surprised that maybe the records might have been given with the machine, I think something like that they would always toss in a Caruso or two because he was such a name, you know, they were saying it's the Caruso of washing machines, it's the Caruso of this, the Caruso of that, of washing machines.
Speaker 3:It's the Caruso of this, the Caruso of that. You find these books of records in machines when you buy them or you see them for sale, and there's always Caruso records.
Speaker 2:You know, years ago, long before you had the internet, when I first started collecting. I got my first Caruso recordings in 1972. And I had seen the movie the Great Caruso with Mario Lanz and so I went to a great source, since I didn't know anybody. I went to a great source since I didn't know anybody. I went to my mother and I said this is a Caruso record. And she said, oh, those are so valuable. And so I was like going holy cow, my life has been made. I have a Caruso recording. Well, the world has changed a lot. I still have two of those records and I read the back of it and I wrote all kinds of stuff as a kid in pencil on the back and I was saying the value you know went through all that stuff I didn't know. And of course, caruso records are far more common than just about any other record.
Speaker 3:Every time you see somebody. Oh, I have, I have a bunch of records my grandfather, you go, look, they're all Caruso, they're all the red label, bat wing Caruso.
Speaker 2:Which they're nice, but they're you know, they're you know. They're all over the place. The ones to look for, of course, are G&Ts or, more so, the Zonophones. The Zonophones are the rarest of the Carusos. I've never had one. I will probably never have one. They're just too expensive. I can't afford that kind of stuff.
Speaker 3:I'm a basement kind of record collector that's why you go to antique shops, because you're going to find stuff like that. I have to start motivating myself to go do that.
Speaker 2:Well, you're going to go to the show In Wayne yeah.
Speaker 3:Absolutely, I will be there. All right, we look forward to that. I will be there. I'm not going to the Stanton auction, but I am going to go, even though Wyatt and everybody's like you're not going to the Stanton auction. Well, you know, it's a two, two day drive from my house, so I'm I'm not really michigan, right yeah halfway across the country as far as I concerned. So, and I just said, joe and tracy go and uh, I just conned them to put something in their car for me on the way back.
Speaker 2:That's great, I'd love to go and, but once again it gets really kind of expensive.
Speaker 3:Right. So I mean, listen, I could film it, there's no question about that, and I could interview people that are buying it and what they're looking for, because everybody's got a different view, everybody collects something different. I mean, some people don't even collect machines. They have one or two and they and everything is music, everything is recordings. Um, I mean to me first thing, I asked somebody, they says, oh, do you buy some records? I said, you have anything with a presidential recording? I'll take it. You know, know, because during that era they exist, but they're hard to find because most people didn't buy them and listen to them and save them. They were listening to.
Speaker 2:Caruso. That's an interesting thing. Just to toss out real quick the first presidential recordings were made in 1908. Everything else before that time were done by voice actors. Interesting thing People sit there and say, well, what about the McKinley recording? I said it's a voice actor and there's a way you can tell If you listen to the cylinder and they start talking and then suddenly you hear a pause. First off they had to be by the horn. If they're speaking, the audience is out there. So the Teddy.
Speaker 3:Roosevelt.
Speaker 2:Teddy Roosevelt. Recordings are Teddy Roosevelt.
Speaker 3:They were all made in 1912 when he was running as a Bull Moose candidate against Wilson.
Speaker 2:The earliest ones are Taft. And what was his name?
Speaker 3:William Jennings Bryant those are the earliest. I have that too. I don't have Taft. I don't think I have Taft. I have william jennings bryant, though both on on cylinder and um disc I don't know. I don't know what disc it is, but yeah, brian, brian kept trying as it were, you couldn't get him to shut up and and because he spoke everywhere.
Speaker 3:and I have a collection of uh, I used to collect before I got into phonographs political pins, so I have from grant grant is my first one to eisenhower I stopped at eisenhower, so I have a lot of pins. I mean obscure candidates a lot of Teddy Roosevelt, no question about it. Obviously a lot of FDR, because he ran so many. Your like a pin and he's on the front and the vice president candidate, andrew Johnson, is on the back. That's cool, it is, and it's in great condition. My goal was Lincoln, but every time I found one that I could afford you couldn't really see it.
Speaker 2:I've got one Lincoln, you do, I've got a Lincoln. It's a got one Lincoln. You do. I've got a Lincoln. It's a 1864 Lincoln coin, I guess I'd call it, and it says freedom on the back of it.
Speaker 3:Well, I shouldn't say my goal was Lincoln, my original goal was Washington, because the Washington ones are cool.
Speaker 2:I've never seen a Washington.
Speaker 3:I've seen them in a museum. I saw them at uh in in uh. There is a house in morristown, new jersey, that's a national historical site and it's a museum um, I forget the name of it and it's where the winter encampment was in Morristown.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's in Morristown, yeah, morristown. So they had a couple there that I saw.
Speaker 3:Yeah, some mansion. And you know, ron, I live in New York and I grew up in northern Jersey. I mean Washington basically slept everywhere, so there were a lot of old houses that still exist today because of it. As a matter of fact, I'm in White Plains where my office is. I mean, the Battle of White Plains was a famous battle when he was retreating. The Great Retreat, or redeployment, as some would say.
Speaker 2:We should stop recording this, yeah well sidetracked.
Speaker 3:So even though I can, cut it out.
Speaker 2:We should sit down and talk about the presidents. It'd be fascinating. I have lots of stuff. I've got like a special pin that was made for Grant, which is kind of cool.
Speaker 3:So yeah, I have a bunch we could do that. If you want, We'll do it on the other podcast.
Speaker 1:I'll cut all this out, Because history is that's why we're talking about all the assassinations.
Speaker 3:I'm talking about all the assassinations. I have JFK people. We're waiting for the new documents to come out. We did one audible one, but now we're doing video. We're going to go back to it. Rfk is going to be a real interesting one, because I'm putting together all the visuals and everything for everyone.
Speaker 2:The RFK case is a real interesting one because his autopsy totally goes against the shooting Correct.
Speaker 3:Amongst other things, that don't you know the girl in the polka dot dress or on you know that his doctor happened to be linked to the MK ultra. I mean, there's a lot, of, a lot of crazy stuff for that and that groups. All right, thank you very much. Uh, thank everybody for listening. I appreciate it. We're going to be back again. This may end up being a two-parter because it's almost an hour and a half. I'll split it into two 45 bits and release them both almost simultaneously, maybe a day apart. Just because when they're an hour and a half nobody listens, they turn it off oh, I know, and I'm sorry, I went on quite a bit here I want you to do that, it's fine.
Speaker 2:I didn't go into too much detail, I tried to just skim over things thank you so much again.
Speaker 3:I definitely want to talk about that JFK stuff. So think about when you have time.
Speaker 1:We'll talk about the conversations and stuff unless you want to do another one of these whatever you want to do, I'd like to get away from records for a little bit.
Speaker 2:I, I, it'd be good to clean the mind a little, and then we'll go well, I learned a lot because now I'm gonna have to focus on getting those older records. Unfortunately, well, that's the fascinating period of time. Um, I think later. I don't want to sit there and talk more because there's so much more to say. Maybe we should do it.
Speaker 3:I found these other little ones, these other little wonder I don't know where. I have more. I have a Victor this size. I know I have them this size, but I have even smaller ones.
Speaker 2:The smallest.
Speaker 3:Victor was seven inch, it was. That's what these are. I got a bunch of these and they're a magnificent shape. I don't know where they came from. I must have bought them from. Actually, I think I bought these from Wyatt. I think Wyatt had a bunch and I said I'm looking for small records, if you got them. When I first spoke to him and he said I have eight or 10, and I said well, I have 80 or 10, but I'm not leaving you with two, I'll take them all. I mean, how do you leave somebody with two records? You know, it's just true. So, all right, thank you very much. Goodbye.
Speaker 3:So, all right, thank you very much. Goodbye, everybody. Talk to you soon. Where's the button?
Speaker 2:There it is.
Speaker 1:There we go, the first words I spoke in the original pornograph. A little piece of practical poetry. Mary had a little lamb, its feet were quite as slow. No-transcript.