I got a new toy
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Literally, a toy.
I saw one of these for the first time last month and thought they were really cool. They were made by The National Toy Company of Boston, MA from 1910 to 1925. There were different characters made.
Link to video -
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@pique said in I got a new toy:
So jealous you have a Victrola! That is a very cool toy!
Four phonographs now...
The cabinet with internal horn that appears in the video:
A Victor Victrola with an external horn. I love this one, and it's incredibly loud, I usually stuff a towel down the horn to dampen the sound:
An Edison cylinder phonograph:
And the latest find, a Standard Talking Machine from the Columbia Graphophone Company with a "Morning Glory" horn. It needs a repair, I've discovered that at some point in the past a bad repair was made to the speed regulator which now causes it to slow down when the needle is lowered to the record. Won't be too difficult to fix. These "talking machines" were part of a sales scheme where one would get the phonograph for free. The hitch being that you had to buy the Standard Talking Machine records (which apparently weren't the best quality). The company ensured you could only play their records on this machine by making the spindle much larger than the standard 78 rpm record. It's 9/16" in diameter. (Someone on eBay sells an adapter platter to allow these players to play standard 78 rpm's.)
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Oh for the days when we loved such simple amusements!
When I lived in San Francisco decades ago I visited the home of a guy who had several restored player pianos. It was so satisfying just to sit there and be entertained, as if by magic!
