Phonograph

When you first stepped into the Linam Ranch Museum one of the first things you noticed was a phonograph with its morning glory horn. Your eye was not only drawn to the sheer size of the machine and horn but also to the beautiful decorations on the horn. This wonderful piece has now come to the Western Heritage Museum Complex and Lea County Cowboy Hall of Fame with the Virgil and Thelma Linam Collection.

In an age of CDs and MP3 players, DVDs and BluRay discs, laptop computers and portable gaming systems, the Edison Standard Phonograph comes to us as an antique and beautiful entertainment system. The model D phonograph in the Virgil and Thelma Linam Collection dates back between 1908-1911. At that time families could not simply drive down the street to the theater or to the movies. Families would entertain themselves and their neighbors by performing music in their own homes on a piano, guitar, banjo, or whatever instrument may be available. The invention of the phonograph allowed families to bring different styles of recorded music and monologues into their homes.

The phonograph was first created by Thomas A. Edison because of his work with both the telephone and telegraph. Edison wanted to make both machines more efficient and able to record and playback messages. From this work Edison eventually filed for a patent on December 24, 1877 for a machine that both recorded sounds and was able to play them back from a piece of tin foil: the phonograph. Leaving the work on his phonograph to focus on the incandescent light bulb, Edison left the door open for Chichester Bell, cousin of Alexander Graham Bell, and Charles Sumner Tainter to make improvements on the phonograph allowing them to create the graphophone which used wax cylinders rather than tin foil. Bell and Tainter wanted to collaborate with Edison but he declined and took up work again on his phonograph adapting their new wax cylinders to his machine. Edison produced improved phonographs eventually coming out with the model D or the "Combination Standard" which could play both 2 and 4 minute cylinders. An acoustic machine, it runs off of a hand-cranked spring motor with an external amplifying horn. Phonographs, when first created, cost about $150 but the model D could be purchased for $20 which was still a lot of money when an average annual income was less than $1000 a year. While the model D phonograph was being created, a process for the mass-production of wax cylinder records was being put into effect which put their cost down to $.35 a piece. While the phonograph allowed people to bring the joy of recorded music into their homes it was still a luxury item and was not in every home yet.

Therefore, the phonograph from the Virgil and Thelma Linam Collection gives us a small hint about what life was like before our modern conveniences and go-go-go attitudes. The phonograph also came with a number of original wax cylinders that allow us to see what kind of music they were listening to including "Put on Your Old Grey Bonnet" and the "Sabre and Spurs March."