100 YEARS OLD VICTROLA

100 year old Victrola demonstration (VIDEO)

The Victor Victrola - Click here to watch the video.

TRANSCRIPTION OF THE VIDEO

INTRO

today's walk down memory lane features this working hundred-year-old victrola this was by far the most popular model although between 1901 and the late 1920s the victor talking machine company sold over 8 million victrolas it's estimated that there are about 600,000 of them still in existence today so this unit is old but not especially rare it was purchased on new year's eve on 1918 in baltimore maryland here's a copy of the receipt it cost a hundred dollars that was a lot of money back then equal to about 1662 of today's dollars the advent or onset of electronic amplification hastened the victrola's demise that was in the late 1920s and then the onset of the great depression was really the final nail in the coffin.

HOW IT WORKS

here's how it works the turntable is powered by a spring which is wound up by this crank on the side of the unit the turntable is engaged by releasing the turntable break here and once it spins up to 78 rpm you can gently lower the arm onto the record like so there's no record there right now but it will be in a minute the tone arm and sound box amplify the vibrations of the steel needle in the groove of the shellac record the sound is carried through cast iron horn underneath the turntable and protects projects out the front of the unit which is right here and so the volume can be adjusted by opening or closing these top doors the bottom area is not really functional but is used to store additional records so that's stored space basically in order to ensure good contact with the groove the needle and its assembly have a tracking force of 115 grams about the weight of a stick of butter due to this high weight the steel needle is replaced each time a record is played fortunately the original owner left a little tin of needles which you can use each time you want to play a record by comparison the tone arm on the turntable i had in college had a tracking force of 1 gram about the weight of an i replaced the diamond tip stylus yearly.

DISASSEMBLY

being a mechanical device the victrola was designed to be maintained getting to the motor is pretty straightforward let's take a look under the hood the first thing is to unscrew the arm that cranks up the spring by turning it counterclockwise until it comes off then the turntable lifts right off and a couple of screws allow you to remove the turntable brake mechanism the motor board is held down by two screws at the front of the unit and once they're removed the entire thing [Music] can flip up and there's even a thoughtful hold up lever to keep it all in place so what to play.

WHAT TO PLAY

when i was a wee lad my parents took the family on vacation and while we were there we saw the 1958 film version of the musical south pacific i loved it when we got home my parents made the mistake of telling me that they had the 1949 broadway soundtrack on 78s so i would proceed to load up the hanger and play them over and over and over again as my siblings can attest so here's the original 1949 recording it is on seven platters 18 songs in all mostly one or two songs on a side interestingly the cover art was created by a guy named alex steinweis who was considered by many to be the father of album cover art before he arrived on the scene record albums were typically just sold in plain brown wrappers so there was nothing unique or particularly creative about them so the piece i've chosen to play is from the 1949 soundtrack twin soliloquies by mary martin and ezio pinza and i think you'll agree that um although the sound is not up to today's standards for a 70 year old record and a 100 year old record player it's still pretty good so let's fire it up and see how it goes.

DEMO

Playing the 78 rpm disk - South Pacific: Twin Soliloquies (Wonder How It Feels) South Pacific (Original Broadway Cast Recording)and.

Ending the video.

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