Graphophone
date: label: date made
content: ca 1888
name: label: maker
content: American Graphophone Company
notes: label: Description
content: This is a business dictation machine that uses wax cylinders to record and play back sound. The basic design for the machine emerged from research at the Volta Laboratory, Washington, D.C., the sound research facility established by Alexander Graham Bell with his associates Chichester Bell and Charles Sumner Tainter.
label: Description
content: Tainter refined the design, patented several versions of it, and oversaw the manufacturing of the first six experimental graphophones at Bergmann & Co in New York in 1885. He also supervised the making of commercial models in a sewing machine factory in Bridgeport, Conn., beginning in 1887. In these early commercial machines, the dictation apparatus sits atop a sewing machine table and employs a treadle to rotate the mandrel holding the cylinder recording.
label: Description
content: On this machine from 1888, the treadle is marked "American Graphophone Company"; the governor is marked "Patented July 20th 1886." The recorder-reproducer is marked: "The Phonograph-Graphophone m'f'd by the American Graphophone Company for Jesse H. Lippincott, Sole Licensee/ Type C No. 03042" and numerous patent dates.
label: Description
content: Reference:
label: Description
content: Wile, Raymond R. "The Development of Sound Recording at the Volta Laboratory," Association for Recorded Sound Collections Journal 21, No. 2, 1990, pp. 208-225.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United States: District of Columbia, Washington
setName: label: See more items in
content: Work and Industry: Mechanisms
label: See more items in
content: Communications
label: See more items in
content: Computers & Business Machines
label: See more items in
content: Hear My Voice
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Gift of Alexander Graham Bell
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: ME.287825
label: catalog number
content: 287825
label: accession number
content: 58498
objectType: label: Object Name
content: graphophone
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: metal (overall: mechanism material)
label: Physical Description
content: iron (overall: table frame material)
label: Physical Description
content: wood (overall: table top material)
label: Measurements
content: table: 32 in x 20 in x 35 in; 81.28 cm x 50.8 cm x 88.9 cm
label: Measurements
content: wheel: 12 in; 30.48 cm
label: Measurements
content: governor: 6 in x 3 in x 5 in; 15.24 cm x 7.62 cm x 12.7 cm
label: Measurements
content: recording and repriducing device: 10 in x 6 1/2 in x 8 in; 25.4 cm x 16.51 cm x 20.32 cm
label: Measurements
content: overall: 33 1/2 in x 32 in x 20 in; 85.09 cm x 81.28 cm x 50.8 cm
label: Measurements
content: overall: container: 7 in x 4 in x 1 in; 17.78 cm x 10.16 cm x 2.54 cm
label: Measurements
content: overall: cr7152: 44 in x 39 in x 26 in; 111.76 cm x 99.06 cm x 66.04 cm