November 28, 2007

Great Record Collectors of the Past

Great Record Collectors of the 1970s

While in the army I acquired a good Minolta 35 mm SLR camera and by the time I started networking with record collectors in the late 1960s and early 1970s I was something of a shutterbug. My photographic skills were (and are) limited, but it soon became apparent that collectors, and their lairs, were at least as interesting as the records they collected. Why not collect collectors, too?

            Many of the people in the following snapshots have contributed greatly to our knowledge of recording history, through their books and articles or simply by preserving historic sounds and sharing them with others. Some are now deceased, but others are still very much with us and active in the field. Most seen here were based on the East Coast, since that’s where I lived. My profound apologies to the many who are not included–it’s probably because I didn’t happen to point a lens in your direction or, if I did, I can’t find the &%$#**!! slides. If you can identify any unidentified faces in these pictures, let me know.

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1. Ted Fagan, U.N. interpreter and co-author of the Victor discography, at his home in Byram, CT. He is ducking out to the right because he didn’t like to be photographed (1970).	2. Ted’s carnivorous fish, kept in separate compartments so they wouldn’t eat each other (1970).
3. A portion of Ted’s “Victor Project” in its raw form (1970).	4. Taping cylinders at the home of Peter Betz, in Johnstown, NY. Peter is at the back (1969).
5. Betz and Berliner expert Paul Charosh examine a cylinder (1971).	6. A portion of Peter’s cylinder vault (1971). A few years later he abandoned collecting and sold his collection.

7. Paul Charosh, perhaps tracking down information for his forthcoming (in 20 years) Berliner discography (1976).	8. Collector/researcher Bill Bryant of Portland ME, examining a record (1973).
9. What’s that matrix number Bill? (1973)	10. Bill Bryant happily posing with a new box of cylinders ( c.1974).
11. Don Cleary’s eagerly anticipated annual New Jersey “garage sale” (1976).	12. Home of dealer Peter Leavitt, Gardiner ME. Would you expect to find 100,000 records in this house? (1972)

13. Peter Leavitt (1972).	14. In the basement, Leavitt’s stock (1972).
15. Jason Coppernoll of Palatine Bridge, NY, a dealer and a gentleman (1972).	16. Why do collectors seem to attract cats? (1972)
17. Coppernoll and part of his stock (1972).	18. The gnarled hands of a master repairman, Al Gerichten (1972).
19. Gerichten in his New Jersey shop (1972).	20. Gerichten at work (1972).
21. A portion of Gerichten’s stock (1972).	22. “Witch’s hat” phonograph horns stacked at Gerichten’s (1972).
23. Charlie Hummel, well-known New Jersey dealer/collector (1973).	24. A portion–just a portion–of Hummel’s vast collection (1973).

25. “September Morn” adorns a collector’s wall. And why not, it’s a collector’s item! (1972)	26. A vivacious lady named Ina adds a little glamour to the phonograph room (1973).
27. Llewellyn Harding, an elderly Portland ME collector who could remember buying pre-1910 records when they were new (1978).	28. Red-jacketed Maurice Pope of Portland ME hosting a meeting of the New England Society for the Preservation of Recorded Sound ( c.1974).
29. Pope’s record room ( c.1974).	30. Records even festooned Pope’s ceiling ( c.1974).
31. Charlie Hodgdon, Newburyport MA collector, whose wife confined his collection to a closet (1972).	32. Charlie’s closet (1972).
33. Money changing hands: well dressed classical collectors at New York’s Vocal Record Collectors Society (1972).	34. A meeting of the VRCS (1972).
35. When Bill Violi (back to camera) arrived with bags of rarities, collectors swarmed around (VRCS, 1972).	36. Dealer Bill Violi (1972).
37. Mardon Hinkle, New York classical collector and relative of early recording artist Florence Hinkle (1885-1931); (1972).	38. Rabbi Arthur Soffer, collector and Mardon’s companion. A short time later they sold their collection and moved to The Netherlands (1972).
39. A meeting of the considerably earthier Record Research Associates, the longtime New York jazz and pop club. George Blacker is presiding (1975).	40. The back row at the RRA meeting shouts encouragement (1975).
41. Noted author and Antique Phonograph Monthly publisher Allen Koenigsberg (1973).	42. A lot was going on at the APM offices (1973).
43. And sitting in the corner, an extraordinarily rare phonautograph! (1974)	44. Edison expert Prof. Ray Wile in his porchfront study (1975).
45. Dr. Philip Petersen, West Coast early-phonograph expert (1976).	46. Bettini expert Robert Feinstein (1976).
47. Famed researcher George Blacker (1976).	48. Blacker with his homemade cylinder machine, the Electrographophone (1976).

49. Close-up of another Electrographophone (1976). 50 (at right). Cylinder recording expert Peter Dilg (1975).
51. Dilg and collector Don Nelson (1974). 52 (at right): Ralph M. Newman, editor of New York rock magazines Bim Bam Boom and Time Barrier Express, with a wall of 45 rpm’s (1972).
53. Newman also collected antique phonographs (1972).	54. The many shades of brown wax cylinders (Newman, 1972).
55. Educator Charles Lane, my onetime English teacher (yeah, blame him!). (1969)	56. The Queens, New York, street on which Glenn Miller lived in 1938 (1974).
57. A Scopitone video jukebox at a Florida museum (1973).	58. Swedish researcher Bjorn Englund, Stockholm (1974).
59. Finnish researcher Pekka Gronow (left) and friend, in Helsinki (1974).	60. Collector Dave Cotter and his son, in Santa Cruz, CA (1971).
61. Martin Bryan, St. Johnsbury, VT, publisher of The New Amberola Graphic (1980s).	62. “When Gabriel Blows His Horn” - the Edison Museum in Fort Myers, FL (1973).