PhonoSightings

Phono-Sightings

Phonographs in Other Museum Settings

This gallery features Phono-Sightings where a phonograph is displayed as part of another display normally in a non-phonograph museum or historic house (e.g., in a 1930's period room, or simply as a one-off example in a museum). Phono-Sightings, therefore, can be serendipitous in how they are discovered and end up in this gallery.

Basel Toy World Museum, Basel, CH

Bates House, The Plainsman Museum, Aurora, NE

Centennial Village Museum, Greeley, CO

Hearthstone Historic House Museum, Appleton, WI

Historic Park Museum, Frisco, CO

Museum of Making Music (MoMM), Carlsbad, CA

Old Homestead House Museum, Cripple Creek, CO

National Museum of American History - The Smithsonian, Washington, D.C.

Sentinel Newspaper Museum, Eureka, NV

Stuhr Museum of the Prairie Pioneer, Grand Island, NE

Historic Park Museum, Frisco, Colorado

Oak Victrola located in the circa 1930's living room of the Bailey Cabin located in the Frisco, Colorado's Historic Park Museum

1950's Radio-Phonograph in the Niemoth Cabin, Frisco, Colorado's Historic Park Museum

Both the Bailey Cabin and the Neimoth Cabin were originally located in Bill's Ranch, south of Frisco. Used as a family summer home this cabin features a river-rock fireplace and has many of the original furnishings.

Pathe Phonograph, Thomas Ranch House, Frisco Historic Park Museum, CO

Victrola, The Stanley House, Frisco Historic Park Museum, CO

Sentinel Newspaper Museum, Eureka, Nevada

Edison Amberola 50 in mahogany next to Jewel Radio at Sentinel Newspaper Museum, Eureka, Nevada. Amberola 50 was introduced in 1915 - Double spring playing up to five cylinders before re-winding. Initial price was $50.00.

Museum of Making Music (MoMM) Carlsbad, California

Edison Disc Phonograph Model C-150 golden oak (Sheraton Design) circa 1918

Victor V - Museum of Making Music

Columbia Graphophone Home Grand (first style c. 1899) - Museum of Making Music

Basel Toy World Museum

The Basel Toy World Museum consists of the "world's largest collection of old teddy bears" and a variety of historical dolls, shops, dollhouses, carousels and contemporary miniatures. I visited this museum in 2011 and only saw one phonograph but as a Friend of the Phonograph it was a delightful one-off sighting.

Cosmopolitan, 1908 - For other "teddy bear" connections see "Teddy Bears and the Phonograph"

Hearthstone Historic House Museum, Appleton, WI

Parlor of Hearthstone Historic House with Edison Standard Phonograph and Edison bust

"Hearthstone Historic House was the first private residence anywhere in the world to be illuminated using hydroelectricity from a central Edison system. The switch was thrown on September 30, 1882 only two weeks after the first-ever Edison central station, which was powered by steam, was operational in New York City. The house still contains the original Edison electroliers, original light switches, and some of the world's only examples of original Edison wiring in situ. Hearthstone is on the National Register of Historic Places for its technological, historic, architectural, and artistic significance." - Home page of Heathstone Historic House Museum.

Courtesy of Hearthstone Historic House Museum

On February 11, 2022 Hearthstone Historic House Museum celebrated Thomas Edison’s 175th birthday and National Inventor's Day!

Here's a wonderful piece of ephemera that was used to promote the event.

Courtesy of Fox Cities Magazine and Heatherstone Historic House Museum

To learn more about the relationship between Opera and early phonograph advertising visit Phonographia's "Willa Cather's Prototypes Who Were Recording Artists".

There are several records which used actors to recreate portions of President McKinley's Last Speech at the Pan-American Exposition delivered on September 5, 1901.

LISTEN HERE to Victor Record 2170 by Leonard G. Spencer (Courtesy The Library of Congress and the Giovannoni/Lynch Collection)

For a short video of McKinley's speech (silent) made by Thomas A. Edison on September 5, 1901, released on September 11, 1901 and courtesy of the Library of Congress watch HERE.

Stuhr Museum of the Prairie Pioneer, Grand Island, NE

Columbia Grafonola, circa 1920 (Stuhr 2020-0017-001)

Edison Standard Phonograph Model A, circa 1904 (Stuhr Museum)

Postcard of Bix Drug Store, Boelus, NE, circa 1910 with Edison Home Model D Phonograph and No. 10 Black Cygnet Horn (Edison 2-minute Gold Moulded cylinder records in cabinet and Edison 4-minute Amberol records on top of case) (Stuhr 1998-0049-008)

Centennial Village Museum, Greeley, CO

Two houses in the Greeley Centennial Village have phonographs as part of their interior furnishings. It is unknown if their is any related provenance between these machines and the homes they are in.

The Bolin House, Victrola 100 circa 1922

The Stevens-Reynolds House, Unidentified Gramophone circa 1903

The Old Homestead House, Cripple Creek, CO

The Old Homestead was built in 1896 and was the most elegant brothel in Colorado's Cripple Creek District during its heyday.

The Bates House, The Plainsman Museum, Aurora, NE

Talking Machine in Bates House Living Room, Plainsman Museum, Aurora, NE