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Forgotten Banjo Masters: Eddie Ross
Giraud Ross Eddinger (a.k.a. Ross Edinger, Eddie G. Ross, and “Blackface” Eddie Ross) was among the last of his kind, a White man performing in burnt-cork at a time when that stereotype was finally fading from favor. For modern audiences, Ross’ background and “blackface” billing have understandably overshadowed the fact that he was a dynamic performer and the composer of some remarkable (albeit largely forgotten) compositions that evoke ragtime’s beginnings.
Eddie Ross was not Canadian, as some writers have claimed, although he often performed in Canada. He was born in Hillsdale, Michigan; married in nearby Jackson; and lived for much of his adult life in Orlando, Florida.
Jackson, Michigan (June 16, 1911)
Ross auditioned for Edison in 1917 but was rejected. He went on to make four test recordings for Victor in 1921. The first, “Ross’ Dog Trot” (recorded July 18, 1921, with piano accompaniment), was apparently enough to convince Victor officials that he had potential. On August 30, he remade the title with studio-orchestra accompaniment for commercial release, coupled with “Ross’ Dog Trot.” According to the Victor ledger, the recordings were “special narrow-groove” matrices, which probably accounts for the record’s tendency to turn up in stripped-out condition.
Camden, NJ: August 31, 1921
Victor 18815 (mx. B 25542 – 2)
Accompanied by the Victor studio orchestra (Rosario Bourdon, conductor)
Ross made three more Victor tests, in June and August 1922. They included a “Whistling Medley,” with monologue — the only confirmed recording of his voice. Unfortunately, no pressings from this or any of the other Victor tests are known to survive.
Ross made only six issued recordings, all of his own cakewalk-style titles that were already outdated from a stylistic standpoint but still very popular, as sales of his first release proved. In 1927 it was transferred to Victor’s “Historical Catalog,” rather than being deleted entirely during the purge of acoustically recorded issues following Victor’s conversion to the electrical process. It’s still one of the most commonly encountered Victors of the period.
Ross’ second release, coupling “Ross’ Juba” and “Ross’ Double Shuffle,” is not as frequently encountered as his first, but musically the “Juba” is even more compelling than his “Reel”:
Camden, NJ: July 5, 1922
Victor 18926 (mx. B 26856 – 1)
Accompanied by studio orchestra (Rosarion Bourdon, conductor), with the addition of Adolph Hirschberg (second tuba). Take 4 was held but not used.
Ross’ final Victor release, coupling “Ross’ Florida Cracker” and “Ross’ Ju Ju Man,” was an attempt to cast him in a more modern vein, with accompaniment by saxophonist Ross Gorman (from Paul Whiteman’s Orchestra) and studio pianist Leroy Shield. It took two sessions and six takes to get an acceptable master of “Florida Cracker,” and the record does not appear to have sold very well.
New York: November 12, 1923
Victor 19213 (mx. B 28905 – 6)
Orlando, Florida (January 19, 1927)
Corsicana, Texas (January 12, 1918)
Edmonton, Canada (June 28, 1918)
Quebec, Canada (December 4, 1921)
Counterfeit Records in the 1940s
(and Beyond)By Allan Sutton
A likely Savoy counterfeit. Pressed on poor-quality material and bearing a suspiciously fuzzy-looking label, its inner margin lacks identifying markings and has a run-out that differs markedly from those found on genuine Savoy discs.
Piracy of sound recordings existed virtually from the beginning of the commercial recording industry, but counterfeiting was a different matter. Whereas early pirated discs usually were issued under different labels than those from which they were copied, counterfeits were made to look like the genuine item, right down to the label artwork. Outright counterfeiting of discs was rare during the American record industry’s early years.
Widespread counterfeiting began to run rampant during the postwar phonograph boom of the late 1940s, helped along by the proliferation of dubbing services and small independent pressing plants eager for business of any sort. Adding to the problem was the reluctance of distributors, dealers, and jukebox operators to ask questions when offered records at far less than market prices.
Rumors of counterfeiting operations had been circulating since the war’s end, primarily victimizing small start-up labels. Billboard reported,
Large firms whose distribution coverage is big enough to blanket a hit-demand market in rapid order have rarely run into bootleggers. Small firms suddenly beset by rush calls for their items have been more fruitful targets for the illicit copies. [1]
The first major case broke in Chicago during the autumn of 1947, after Tower Records president Richard Bradley discovered that distributors and retailers had ample supplies of a newly released hit by Jack Owens, even though production was bottlenecked at Towers’ pressing plants. His suspicions were further aroused after discovering that the pressings were being handled by an unlicensed distributor. After ruling out theft from his own plants as the source, Bradley contacted Treasury Department officials in Chicago, who agreed to investigate the case because of the potential loss of federal excise tax on those sales.
The start of the second American Federation of Musicians’ recording ban in December 1948 was widely viewed as an open invitation to piracy. Several weeks before the ban took effect, band leader Bob Crosby (whose Decca contract had recently expired) was called by an unnamed individual wanting Crosby to slip him a radio transcription, presumably for processing into black-market records. [2] The larger problem, however, remained the counterfeiting of existing, legitimate commercial releases.
During the spring of 1948, the investigation expanded to Los Angeles, where an interstate counterfeiting ring was thought to be operating. Paul Reiner, the president of Black & White Records, had recently discovered counterfeit Black & White and Jewel pressings on which no master numbers were visible. Variety reported,
There are dozens of indie plants in this area that will job-lot anything handed to them to work on, with no questions asked. Reps of legit firms are convinced that as many as 40,000 copies of hits tunes are surreptitiously turned out weekly and fed into the various record markets in competition with bonafide platters, at 25¢ a copy… Al Katz, who handled distribution here on “Near You” for Bullet records, claims he has knowledge of at least 5,000 copies of that tune which didn’t originate with him.” [3]
In short order, counterfeit pressings bearing Aladdin, King, National, Savoy, and Specialty labels were also identified throughout the Los Angeles area.
Unlike the earlier record pirates, who usually produced masters by electroplating commercial pressings, most postwar counterfeiters favored electrical dubbing, leading Bob Hope to quip, “What’s crime coming to? Somehow I can’t picture a masked figure running down the street at 2 a.m. with a smoking revolver in one hand and a wire recorder in the other.” [4] Printing plates were produced from photographic copies of the originals labels, often resulting in a less-than-crisp appearance.
In some cases, the counterfeit pressings were wholesaled for as little as 25¢, a strong signal that they were not legitimate. “Dealers know this is going on,” the Los Angeles Daily News reported, “‘but what are we going to do,’ one asked. ‘We get the same record for 15 cents less—naturally we make more money on it.’” [5]
And so the battle initially was taken to distributors and dealers who were handling the counterfeits. In April 1948 Miracle Records, a small Chicago producer, secured a temporary restraining order against the Millner Record Sales Company, alleging that Millner was selling “inferior reproductions of Miracle’s original hits [bearing] counterfeit labels.” [6]
Subsequent investigation revealed that Millner had no hand in producing the counterfeit discs, and was an unwitting accomplice in their distribution. In a sworn deposition, Millner executive Milton Saul identified A. M. Wolfe, Forrest (War) Perkins, and Perkins’ Day Distributing Company (which operated its own pressing plant) as the source of the bogus discs. Saul testified that he had ordered shipments to stop once he was informed by Miracle that the pressings were counterfeit. [7] On July 19, the case against Millner was dismissed. [8]
Savoy warns against purchasing
counterfeit records (May 1948)
Shortly after Miracle filed its lawsuit, Savoy Records’ Herman Lubinsky declared that a Los Angeles ring had turned out a million counterfeit copies of Savoy hits in recent months. [9] [10] On an expected sale of 250,000 Black & White records, the Los Angeles Daily News reported, only 10,000 discs were said to be genuine. [11]
Billboard reported that the Los Angeles rings so far were focusing exclusively on race records, peddling the counterfeit pressings in “neighborhoods where such records would be in high demand.” But the discovery in early 1948 of a counterfeit Decca record by Louis Jordan in a Central Avenue record store offered the first clue that mainstream hits on major labels were now being counterfeited as well. [12] One reporter noted, “[Decca] officials, in the fit of coy shyness which occasionally afflicts Hollywood citizens, don’t like the fact bruited about.” [13]
In early April, a group of Capitol, Columbia, Decca, and RCA Victor executives gathered in Capitol’s Hollywood office, where they agreed to help underwrite an investigation. [14] At the same time, unscrupulous distributors and dealers were proving to be so successful at selling counterfeit copies that one record-company official reportedly considered letting them handle his legitimate output. [15]
War Perkins proved to be of particular interest to various investigators. Although Perkins ran a legitimate operation, it was not the first time he had been accused of producing and selling illicit goods. In January 1948, he had been sued by band leader Roy Milton for issuing two sides by Milton’s Solid Senders that were dubbed from radio broadcasts without Milton’s knowledge or consent. [16], [17] However, Perkins denied having any connection with the Miracle case, or any knowledge of the counterfeit records’ source, which was widely rumored to be a pressing plant in Paris, Texas.
The only pressing plant operating at the time in Paris, Texas, was the Swing Record Manufacturing Company, a small start-up owned by Jimmy Mercer (née Harry Schaefer, a.k.a. Jivin’ Joe Jackson). His checkered past included a 1928 conviction for robbery and forgery, and allegedly, a 1931 arrest for passing bad checks. By the mid-1940s, Mercer had moved to Paris, where he worked at radio station KPLT, operated the Melody Lane Record Shop, and gave piano lessons. Mercer is perhaps the best-documented example of a small-time entrepreneur whose output simultaneously included original, pirated, and counterfeit records.
(Left) A 1946 advertisement for Jimmy Mercer’s record shop. (Right) Mercer at his record press, which he claimed could produce 2,700 records per day.
The October 1946 launch of Mercer’s Swing Records was well covered in the local press. The Paris News devoted a feature story to the company in November, at which time Mercer invited local artists to audition for his new Swing and Downbeat labels (the latter having no connection to DownBeat magazine). [18] Mercer’s records were pressed on poor-quality recycled scrap and bore equally shoddy labels. He regularly solicited broken records in the local want-ads, along with “strong active women” to work the night shift at his plant. [19]
Although Mercer claimed to be pressing for several “well known” (but undisclosed) labels, his only confirmed connection with the established companies consisted of pirating their discs. He is known to have copied recordings from Atlantic, Cow Town, Freedom, 4 Star, Gold Star, and other labels, which he then issued on his own labels. Gold Star’s Bill Quinn sued Mercer, then settled out of court after Mercer agreed to purchase some masters from the company. Atlantic Records reportedly threatened legal action as well.
It was Mercer’s party-record pressings (some on the Zest and Zip labels, others lacking any brand name) rather than his pirating and counterfeiting activities, that eventually brought him to the attention of federal authorities. In March 1949, he was arrested and charged with delivering obscene records for shipment across state lines. He pled guilty to two counts in January 1950, and was sentenced to three years’ probation.
Mercer’s arrest marked the end of his involvement with the record business. With few other offenders apprehended, the investigation into record counterfeiting wound down in the early 1950s, causing the problem to worsen considerably. By September 1951, Billboard was reporting that one operation in the New York area, which had so far eluded all efforts at detection, was believed to be pressing more than 50,000 counterfeit discs weekly. [20]
Record counterfeiting would continue unabated into the LP era, even as attempts to locate and prosecute the perpetrators were becoming increasingly successful. In November 1960, thirty-five detectives and police officers raided a major counterfeiting operation in North Hollywood, California, arresting Brad Atwwood (who was already under indictment in New Jersey) and six others. [21]
Rev. Richard Engel and partners in crime, May 1961. The lower photo was taken at the time of their arrest in New York.
One of the highest-profile busts of the LP era involved Rev. Richard Engel, an ordained Evangelical minister and owner of Bibletone Records. In May 1961, Engel and his associates were arrested while celebrating a new counterfeit-record deal over drinks at New York’s Plaza Hotel. An informant had identified them as the heads of an East Coast operation accused of pressing more than 50,000 bootleg Frank Sinatra albums, among other offences. Engel was charged with grand larceny, conspiracy to commit grand larceny, and conspiracy to violate trademark laws. [22]
The reverend and his cronies were a major catch, but they would not be the last, by any means.
NOTES
[1] “Tower Calls on T-Men to Trace Bootleg Discs.” Billboard (November 15, 1947), p. 20.
[2] “Black Market Ready to Take Over the Discs.” Elyria Chronicle-Telegram (December 15, 1947), p. 7.
[3] “Major Diskers Crack Down on Coast Bootlegging of Hit Recordings.” Variety (April 7, 1948), p. 42.
[4] Hope, Bob. “It Says Here.” Winona Republican-Herald (March 29, 1949). p. 4.
[5] “Counterfeit Records Turned Out in L.A.” Los Angeles Daily News (July 27, 1948), p. 17.
[6] “Bogus Records for Phonographs Charged in Suit.” St. Louis Globe-Democrat (April 23, 1948), p. 6.
[7] “Saul, Perkins Depositions Clash as Court Probes Miracle Claims vs. Millner on Bogus Wax Charge.” Billboard (July 17, 1948), pp. 3–4.
[8] “Court Clears Millner Co. of All Bogus Disk Charges.” Billboard (August 21, 1948), p. 37.
[9] Ibid.
[10] “Attention! Warning!” (Savoy Records notice). Billboard (May 1, 1948), p. 38.
[11] “Counterfeit Records Turned Out,” op. cit.
[12] “Law Closes In on Bogus Disk Ring; MPPA Joins In.” Billboard (April 17, 1948), p. 32.
[13] Ibid.
[14] “Major Diskers Crack Down,” op. cit.
[15] “Distrib Pitch for Race Wax Seen Cause of Bogus Disks.” Billboard (May 22, 1948), p. 26.
[16] “Plan to Beat Petrillo Runs into Snag.” Los Angeles Times (January 8, 1948), p. 2;
[17] “Off-Air Recording Brings Legal Hassle.” Cash Box (January 24, 1948), p. 32.
[18] “New Business Here Makes Records.” Paris [TX] News (November 24, 1946), p. 2.
[19] “Wanted—Strong Active Women…” (classified advertisement). Paris [TX] News (November 10, 1947), p. 1.
[20] Martin, Joe. “‘Disklegger’” Is Plague to Record Mfrs.” Billboard (September 1, 1951), p. 1.
[21] “Indict Seven on Disk Bootlegging Charges.” Billboard (November 7, 1960), pp. 4, 24.
[22] “Bootleg Disk Front Breaks Wide Open in Gotham, East.” Billboard (May 8, 1961), pp. 2, 169.
Related Article: Piracy and Counterfeiting in the Early American Record Industry
©2004 by Allan R. Sutton. All rights are reserved.
Battle of the Speeds: LPs, 45s, and the
Decline of the 78
(1939 – 1950)By Allan Sutton
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As early as 1939, Columbia Records president Edward Wallerstein had authorized research into a long-playing disc, with the backing of CBS executives. He had assembled a first-rate research and development group that reported to Peter Goldmark, who attributed his early interest in longer-playing discs to a “sincere hatred” of the phonograph as it then existed. Goldmark’s team included Columbia Records’ Jim Hunter (who had been involved in the development RCA’s long-playing Program Transcriptions a decade earlier), Ike Rodman, Vin Liebler, Bill Savory, CBS’s Rene Snepvangers (who was charged with developing a suitable lightweight pickup), and William S. (Bill) Bachman (who was recruited from General Electric).
Read Bill Bachman’s recollections of the LP’s development
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Peter Goldmark and Rene Snepvangers, 1948. Goldmark was quick to take credit for the LP, although he “didn’t actually do any of the work,” according to Edward Wallerstein. (CBS Photo Archive)
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Although Peter Goldmark is often credited as the inventor of the microgroove LP, Wallerstein later claimed that Goldmark “didn’t actually do any of the work”:
I want to emphasize that the project was all a team effort. No one man can be said to have “invented” the LP, which in any case was not, strictly speaking, an invention, but a development. The team of Liebler, Bachman, Savory, Hunter, and Rodman was responsible for it. If one man is to be singled out, it would have to be Bachman, whose work on the heated stylus, automatic variable pitch control, and most especially the variable reluctance pickup was a starting point for a great deal of what was to come. [1]
The new records were to employ a 0.001” (1-mil) “microgroove,” which Wallerstein had seen tested at RCA during his tenure there. The decision to press in vinyl came from Jim Hunter, who determined that its use would not require major modifications to the existing plating and pressing equipment at Columbia’s Bridgeport plant. [2]
Exhibiting remarkable foresight, in 1939 Wallerstein ordered that Columbia’s new studios be equipped to record simultaneously on standard 78-rpm masters and 16″ acetate blanks. The latter were to be held in reserve, in an air-conditioned vault, as a stockpile of masters from which the long-playing discs could be dubbed when the time came. [3] A decade later, Wallerstein’s forward-looking decision, along with Columbia’s early adoption of tape mastering after the war, would hand the company a distinct advantage over RCA Victor in the conversion to long-playing records.
Development of the long-playing microgroove disc was well under way when the United States’ entry into World War II forced Columbia to put the project on hold. Work did not resume in earnest until 1946. By then, the once-moribund Columbia label had reclaimed its place as one of the leading names in the American record market. “The time was ripe,” Wallerstein recalled, “for the introduction of something new into the industry.” [4]
Late in the year, Columbia engineers demonstrated a long-playing record that unfortunately fell far short of Wallerstein’s expectations. As costs mounted, CBS president William Paley became increasingly impatient for a launch and ordered Wallerstein, Hunter, and members of the engineering team to meet with him every two months. Every detail had to be carefully researched, from cutting angles to heated cutting styli, in the seemingly contradictory quest for higher fidelity and longer playing time. After considerable experimentation, which at one point involved recording gunfire in the studio, the American-made microphones were retired in favor of a superior condenser model captured from the Germans.
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Fritz Reiner, Edward Wallerstein, Goddard Lieberson, and George Szell examine the new LP.
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Columbia took another step closer to LP conversion in mid-1947, when it began mastering on magnetic tape, although tape would not be employed to any great extent for several more years. [5] In the meantime, the engineers had produced a seventeen-minute 33 1/3-rpm prototype disc, now being referred to internally as simply “LP” (the first documented use of that term). Although the prototype appeared promising, it was rejected by CBS management in the fall of 1947, with orders given to extend the playing time to at least twenty minutes. [6]
The timing problem was soon solved, but the LP was facing a more serious impediment in its journey to market — there were not yet any consumer-grade phonographs capable of playing the records, nor any any way of modifying existing phonographs to handle them. Although the recording technology had been largely perfected by the end of 1947, the development of affordable players had lagged — the same problem that had plagued RCA’s long-playing Program Transcriptions in the early 1930s. In addition to a 33 1/3-rpm turntable, a high-quality permanent stylus and lightweight tone-arm would be required.
After concluding that Columbia’s engineers had neither the skills nor time to create such a device, Wallerstein contracted with radio manufacturer Philco to develop and manufacture the first models. [7] Working closely with the CBS team, Philco’s engineers quickly delivered an inexpensive, single-speed player turntable that could be attached to an owner’s existing radio or electrical phonograph.
In January 1948, Wallerstein was elected chairman of the board of Columbia Records, and CBS vice-president Frank K. White assumed the presidency that Wallerstein had vacated. By then, the microgroove LP was fast approaching its final form, with playing time now extended to twenty-two minutes on a twelve-inch side. After having kept the project under wraps for so long, Paley and Wallerstein began quietly demonstrating the new records to select industry insiders in an attempt to garner licensing deals. Wallerstein demonstrated the LP to RCA president David Sarnoff in April 1948, in a meeting that reportedly did not go well. He fared better in England, where he recalled that officials of Decca Ltd. and Electric and Musical Industries, were impressed, although not in a position to take the plunge. [8]
With a tremendous archive of recordings in transcription form, little consideration was given to making new LP recordings for the moment. Instead, a team comprising Bill Savory, Paul Gordon, and Howard Scott, under Bill Bachman’s supervision, was handed the arduous task of transferring selected 16” acetate transcriptions to new microgroove LP masters. A clean segue between sides was required for extended classical works, a touchy process that did not always go well, as Ward Botsford recounted in a 1976 High Fidelity article:
Even if the first segue was right, the second or third or fourth or fifth might blow, and the three men would say impolite words and go right back to the beginning. To say that all of this required a certain knack is to say the least… When the team was about a third of the way through the project, Bachman broke the news that they had been inadvertently cutting with the wrong size stylus. And so, three months already shot, they had to start from scratch. Things got serious then, and Scott brought in a mattress. [9]
At the end of May 1948, Billboard magazine reported that CBS executives were still “maintaining complete silence on the entire project,” apparently unaware that Wallerstein was already demonstrating the LP to other producers. As far as the public was concerned, that silence was finally broken on June 18, when Columbia hosted a preview of the new records and player for recording-industry executives, during which the technical details were openly disclosed for the first time.
Two days later, member of the press were given their first glimpse of the LP when Wallerstein demonstrated it to fifty reporters at New York’s Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. In a dramatic visual demonstration, he posed next to an eight-foot high tower of 78-rpm albums, holding an armful of new LPs, and announced, “Gentlemen,what I hold in my hands represents the same amount of music contained in that giant stack of 78s.” The demonstration would be repeated elsewhere by Peter Goldmark and other Columbia and CBS executives.
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Peter Goldmark demonstrates the LP’s compactness.
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The initial LP catalog was released on the same day. Beginning with Mendelssohn’s Concerto in E Minor by Nathan Milstein and the New York Philharmonic conducted by Bruno Walter (ML 4001), it consisted of 101 mostly classical records. Columbia then took its show on the road, demonstrating the new records to dealers on a nationwide tour that wrapped-up in Utah a month later. [10] The records and players were on sale to the general public by early September. Cover art was sacrificed In the rush to get the records to market. Several generic boilerplate designs (of which the the “tombstone” cover for Masterworks releases saw the most use) would suffice for most releases into the early 1950s.
Cover art suffered in Columbia’s rush to get the LP to market.
Most of Columbia’s early LPs were simply cobbled together from recordings that had previously been issued as 78s. The records were pressed in ten- and twelve-inch formats (the latter reserved primarily for classical works), with retail prices ranging from $2.85 for standard ten-inch releases to $4.85 for the twelve-inch Masterworks series. In a case of unfortunate timing, a seven-inch LP, retailing for 60¢ and devoted largely to pop material, was introduced in January 1949 — just a few months ahead of RCA’s 45-rpm disc, which catered to the same market and would prove far more popular.
In April 1949, Columbia reduced the retail prices of its standard 78s to 60¢ from the industry-standard 75¢. By late 1948, distributors were reporting a marked increase in sales of Columbia LPs, with a corresponding drop in sales of 78s despite the recent price cut.
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Despite the “Beethoven to Blues” claim (top), Columbia’s early LP output was heavily skewed toward classical material. The seven-inch LP (bottom) was aimed primarily at the pop market.
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Realizing that there was little patentable about the LP, and that it could succeed commercially only if the format was universally adopted, CBS executives rethought their original licensing plan. In June 1948, the company made the microgroove LP format freely available to other companies, some of whom returned the favor by giving Columbia their LP pressing business, at least until they were able to retool their own plants. The result was an explosion of interest in the new format by major and minor labels alike. Legal, financial, and logistical issues would crop up, including the need to recalculate artists’ royalty rates (requiring negotiations with the notoriously uncooperative American Federation of Musicians’ James Caesar Petrillo), a demand by Standard Transcription that Columbia pay double recording rates for material transferred from its masters, and the need to quickly supply radio stations with microgroove-capable equipment) but they did little to impede development. [11]
The conversion to plastic LP pressings would be a fairly straightforward process. A wartime shellac shortage had forced producers to experiment with synthetic pressing materials, including various vinyl- and styrene-based formulations, so by 1948 many pressing plants already had several years’ experience working with those materials. The conversion to high-fidelity microgroove recording appeared to be more daunting, but Audio Record magazine assured its readers (consisting mainly of independent studio owners and engineers) that the transition “is an easy one from the equipment point of view.” C. J. LeBel outlined the basic steps for nervous recording engineers:
The most important [step] is provision for cutting at micro pitch — in the range of 224 to 260 lines per inch. Probably 224 to 240 lines is the most desirable for most applications. Some equipment already made has provisions for this without change… In other apparatus some change is necessary. An overhead feed mechanism relies on a change of lead-screw for change of pitch. To make this shift, then, it is only necessary to purchase and insert a new lead-screw.
The electrical characteristics are even simpler to achieve… we would use normal transcription recording characteristics. This would be either the NAB standard 16-db boost at 10,000 cycles, or the standard 10-db boost which many studios have found to be their usable limit. Columbia microgroove characteristic is the same as NAB, except that the response is slightly higher below 100 cycles. A simple equalizer will take care of this. For a great deal of the work the difference is negligible, and standard transcription equalization can be used. [12]
As eager as many companies were to adopt the new format, few were ready to forsake the 78 entirely. The London label (which added LPs to its line-up in 1949, and 45s in January 1950) took a step back in April 1950 with its “Shellac Is Not Dead” campaign. To prove its point, London announced it was issuing twelve new 78-rpm album sets and twenty new 78-rpm singles, but only two 45s and one LP, during the campaign, which was soon scuttled. [13]
Some dealers actively opposed the transition, seeing it as a form of price-cutting and fearing they would be left with a glut of unsalable 78s. Among them was David Krantz. president of the Philadelphia Retail Record Dealers’ Association, and producer of the minuscule Krantz Records label. In early 1949 he launched a crusade against the LP that succeeded only in losing business for his store and antagonizing some Columbia sales executives. Krantz’s campaign ended abruptly in June 1950, when he and seven other Philadelphia record-store owners were arrested and charged by the Justice Department with conspiracy to fix record prices. [14]
Krantz and his kindred spirits were the exception. Despite some initial trepidation, the LP format was soon being embraced by record companies and dealers alike, in no small part because of its potential for wringing additional profits from recordings that had already run their course, as far as sales, in 78 form. The redundancy apparently did not bother consumers, who rushed to replace their old shellac pressings with the new quieter, trendier long-playing editions.
Announcements of companies’ impending LP launches were appearing regularly in the trade papers by late 1948. Some were premature, and there were a few false starts. Savoy announced its first LP release in December 1948, dubbed from previously released Errol Garner 78s, then but retreated; the company would not begin issuing LPs on a regular basis until March 1950. The Bihari brothers announced that Modern Records was about to launch LPs in the summer of 1949, but the first releases did not begin to appear until October 1950. [15] Some record companies undertook the conversion piecemeal, often testing the waters with the less-lucrative segments of their catalogs before committing to large-scale LP output. Allegro, which Paul Puner had launched after leaving Musicraft, began by test-marketing children’s LPs; Dial, which was predominantly a jazz label, began with a small group of LP classical albums using leased foreign masters.
Atlantic, Mercury, and M-G-M took the LP plunge in early 1949, followed by Tempo in May, Decca in August (nearly a year before its British counterpart did so), and a host of smaller labels as the year came to a close. The independent classical labels, in particular, were quick to embrace the microgroove LP. Among the earliest to do so was Vox, which began releasing LPs in early May 1949. [16] The albums were produced in two series, retailing for $4.85 for domestic recordings, or $5.85 for foreign recordings licensed from Polydor, its various affiliates, and Discophile Francais. Billboard reported that Columbia Records was giving Vox its full cooperation in making the conversion (Columbia was not being entirely altruistic, having gained Vox’s pressing business in the process). In November, Vox announced that it was abandoning 78-rpm production entirely. [17] Cetra-Soria, based in Italy, soon followed suit for its American releases. The prestigious Concert Hall Society began with a single “experimental” LP in January 1949, [18] and by the early 1950s it had followed Vox’s lead to become an LP-only line. Several new entrants in the classical field during 1949–1951, including Period and Renaissance, went directly to LP production without having produced 78s.
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Cetra-Soria and Renaissance were among the independent classical labels availing themselves of Columbia’s microgroove LP technology and pressing services in the late 1940s and early 1950s.
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In response to all of this activity, independent manufacturers began turning out multi-speed phonographs as fast as they could retool their production lines. A February 1949 Billboard article listed dozens of new changers that could play both 78s and 33s. At the entry level were turntable attachments like Philco’s. For consumers flush with post-war cash, there were multi-speed automatic changers with built-in AM-FM radios, and Westinghouse even offered changer-radio-television combinations that retailed from $625 to $725. [19]
RCA officials offered no public comment on the microgroove LP until early 1949, when they countered with what they hinted would be a revolutionary new format. RCA made much of the project’s top-secret status, which it code-named “Madame X,” while leaking just enough information to keep the public intrigued. By late January the basic facts were already known: “Madame X” was to be a small-diameter, fine-groove 45-rpm disc with matching changer. [20] In February, Audio Record magazine reported,
No technical information has yet been released, but we have collected the available data… X is a thin 7” pressing of pure vinyl. The center hole is large — about 1½ inches in diameter. Maximum playing time is 5½ minutes. Fine grooves are employed, and the playback stylus is 1 mil… So far as we can tell, the recording characteristic is the same as that used on standard Victor records…
The point which has aroused the widest controversy is the speed: 45 rpm. It is rumored that 33 1/3 rpm was tried and discarded… A moment’s consideration will show that for a given diameter, 45 rpm will give 35% higher linear groove velocity than will 33 1/3 rpm. It would be possible to get the same linear groove velocity at 33 1/3 rpm by increasing the outside diameter to 9½ inches, which would increase the vinyl cost 82% over the 7 inch size. [21]
A month later, in the same publication, RCA engineer D. D. Cole came forth with a detailed description of the new records and matching player, along with his company’s rationale for introducing them. [22] RCA’s contention was that the myriad problems inherent in recorded-sound reproduction could be solved only with a fully integrated system, so considerable effort was expended in developing the compact changers that would be required to play the new records. Recalling the old premium-scheme phonographs of the early 1900s, [23] they were designed to foil the use of any record other than the 45, although Cole promised that multi-format changers were in development. The new record-and-changer combination was touted as the “first in history of the industry to be designed specifically to complement each other” — conveniently overlooking Columbia’s new LP player as well as RCA’s own Program Transcription disc-and-player combination of the early 1930s. [24]
RCA’s new records and players were introduced to the general public with considerable fanfare in April 1949. Cole assured customers that 78-rpm records were in no imminent danger of disappearing, but his wording provided a subtle hint that they were already becoming an after-thought: “RCA Victor,” Cole declared, “will continue to serve the standard market by making all selections recorded for the 45-rpm system also available on 78-rpm records.” [25] He announced a novel plan to allocate different colors of vinyl to each series: red for Red Seals, black for standard popular, green for country-and-western, yellow for children’s, cerise for rhythm-and-blues, light blue for international, and dark blue for what he termed “popular classics.” Advertising was undertaken on an international scale. Even before the records were placed on sale, RCA Victor sales manager Frank McCall was dispatched to Cuba on the first leg of a seven-week trip to promote the new format to Latin American distributors.
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An early 1950s advertisement for RCA Victor’s 45, showing the color-coded transparent vinyl pressings, and the player attached to a radio unit.
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RCA executives had predicted that other record manufacturers would rush to produce 45s, as they had with Columbia’s LP, which proved not to be the case. Unlike the LP, the 45 embodied some patented features, for which RCA initially demanded a licensing fee. The unusually thin pressings, thick raised label areas, and oversized spindle holes required that new presses be purchased or existing ones retooled. Both issues served to discourage adoption by companies that were already heavily invested in the conversion to LPs. Consumers were slow to warm to the 45 as well, citing the shortage of selections arising from other companies’ refusal to sign-on with RCA. Many who might otherwise have embraced the new format had already purchased LP players, which could not yet handle 45s.
With consumer resistance showing little sign of abating, RCA ultimately was forced to follow Columbia’s lead, dropping its licensing requirement and offering support to other producers in the form of technical advice and pressing services. Nevertheless, adoption of the 45 continued to lag. Capitol Records was the only major label to immediately test the new format. [26] By turning the pressing over to RCA, Capitol managed to get a small selection of 45s to market by April 1949. [27] M-G-M followed several months later, but smaller producers remained aloof. One of the few to attempt the conversion in 1949 was Gabor Szabo, who had managed RCA Victor’s foreign-record division until 1941, and had since maintained an on-again off-again relationship with the company. In the summer of 1949, he briefly test-marketed an inexpensive 45-rpm disc, pressed in inferior “Websterlite” plastic, then shelved the project. Thus, Chicago-based Rondo Records became the first small producer to reach the market with 45s, barely nudging out the even more minuscule Discovery Records for the honor in January 1950. [28]
In December 1949, Billboard reported a “major metamorphosis” in RCA’s approach to the 45 that hinted of sour grapes:
The company is now distinctly cool to the idea or necessity of persuading other diskeries to adopt 45. The reason for the attitude is two-fold. Firstly, RCA has had to go it alone; secondly, the company now figures it has carved out a sizable market for itself in 45, and any diskery venturing into this market would mean a lessening of RCA’s profit therein. [29]
In the same story, it was reported that Decca executives had begun “gauging and checking” the 45-rpm market. Columbia was planning to launch 45s as well. Edward Wallerstein, despite his openly expressed disdain for the little records, gave the go-ahead for Columbia to start producing them in late 1949, assuring dealers that his company would make “any record the public wanted.” [30] The London label began offering 45s in January 1950, along with the tiny Goldband and Folkstar lines. When Decca joined the fray in July, apparently having completed its “gauging and checking,” the 45 finally began to gain some traction in the marketplace.
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With demand increasing for 45s, RCA issued this notice in an attempt to standardize labels among its four pressing plants.
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By the mid-1950s, the 45 would become the preferred format for pop singles. Classical enthusiasts, however, were decidedly cool toward yet another format that required side-changes every five minutes. Columbia executive Edward Wallerstein recalled,
RCA especially spent huge sums of advertising money trying unsuccessfully to convince the public that the 45 was really a good thing for classics. Our policy for advertising was not to compare the products. We were pushing LPs, and there was no comparison… Actually the introduction of 45s didn’t touch the sales of LPs at all. Columbia quickly began to issue single pops records on 45s, which were and indeed still are, the accepted medium for singles. I was amazed when I learned that during the period in which RCA held out against the LP — that is, from June 1948 to January 1950, it lost $4.5 million. [31]
Trade-paper reports of the period confirm that Columbia’s classical Masterworks LPs were outselling RCA’s 45-rpm Red Seal sets by a substantial margin. Sales of the 45-rpm Red Seal sets, already hobbled by consumer resistance, were further undermined by RCA’s ill-conceived decision, in June 1949, to place portions of its 78-rpm catalog on “clearance sale,” with discounts ranging from forty to fifty percent. The result, dealers reported, was huge sales of the discounted 78-rpm Red Seal album sets that undercut demand for the more expensive (and for RCA, more profitable) 45-rpm versions.
After taking a loss on record sales in 1949, RCA finally capitulated and began preparations to produce its own LPs, becoming the last major producer to do so. The impending arrival of a three-speed RCA player was announced in early December 1949. On January 4, 1950, the company announced that it was making its classical library available in LP format; pop LPs followed several months later. RCA was at a technical disadvantage at first, having to rely largely on dubbings from 78-rpm pressings for most of its early releases. However, the records were pressed in better material than the Columbia LPs and featured attractive album-cover artwork, unlike Columbia’s generic, boilerplate designs. They were an immediate hit with dealers and customers alike.
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Arthur Fiedler plugging the RCA 45. Columbia’s Edward Wallerstein recalled that RCA “spent huge sums of advertising money trying unsuccessfully to convince the public that the 45 was really a good thing for classics.”
The proliferation of new formats and adoption of the microgroove standard had been unsettling for many small producers. With standard 78s still selling in large numbers, and no clear winner yet in battle between LPs and 45s, prevailing wisdom held that it was essential to release recordings in all three formats — an expense that many smaller producers were unwilling or unable to take on. As early as November 1948, Allegro president Paul Puner had requested that the Department of Commerce intervene in the increasingly chaotic situation. His request for standardization was flatly denied by Assistant Secretary Thomas Blaidesell, who advised, “We can appreciate the present difficulties facing your industry, but do not feel, operating under a free economy as we do, that this department could intervene in situations of this kind unless directed to so do by law.” [32]
The same uncertainty plagued the jukebox industry. Seeburg’s vice-president, after conducting an extensive study of the situation, complained,
“The Battle of the Speeds,” a highly controversial subject with the public, has, apparently, been equally confusing to the record manufacturers themselves and it, therefore, becomes a very delicate and speculative issue for those of us who are on the outside observing the internal turmoil within the record industry.” [33]
He concluded that the LP was not suitable for jukebox use, but he was enthusiastic about the 45, praising its quality as “so far superior [to 78s] that it is really amazing.” He particularly liked the longer playing time, thinking it would encourage jukebox operators to stock short classical pieces — a market he foresaw (quite incorrectly) as potentially lucrative. Nevertheless, Seeburg announced that it had no immediate plans to introduce a 45-rpm machine.
Others in the jukebox industry shared Seeburg’s wait-and-see attitude. At the end of 1949, executives at Wurlitzer, AMI, and other jukebox manufacturers were still expressing concerns over whether the format would be widely enough adopted by other companies to assure a wide selection of titles. Lester C. Rieck, sales manager of H. C. Evans & Company (the manufacturer of Constellation jukeboxes) told Billboard,
If this record is universally accepted by the record-playing public, then without a doubt a large library of selections will be made available. When this time comes, and only then, will the 45-rpm record prove to be a money-maker for music-machine operators… It is going to take time, possibly years, to completely outmode the playing of 78-rpm record. [34]
A Rock-Ola executive cited technical problems in adapting its mechanisms to the new discs. “We have run into so many difficulties in adapting them to our phonograph,” he reported, “that we have just about shelved the idea for the present.” An Aereon official, although enthusiastic about 45s and their potential, admitted that his company was not actively engaged in designing a machine to play them. [35]
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Williams Manufacturing was one of several small companies that introduced 45-rpm jukeboxes while the major manufacturers hesitated. This ad for its Music Mite, with RCA changer mechanism, appeared in December 1950.
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While the major manufacturers stalled and made excuses, some smaller companies moved to fill the vacuum, in some cases assisted by RCA which supplied them with changer mechanisms. Finally spurred to action, the larger manufacturers were soon flooding the market with new models, and conversion kits for 78-rpm machines. In November 1950, Cash Box (the jukebox industry’s trade magazine) began listing 45s in its sales charts, noting, “There is no longer any doubt of the growing interest in the 45s.” [36]
Jukebox operators proved to be heavy consumers and promoters of the little records, and demand them soared at the expense of the 78. By the early 1950s all of the major labels, and a rapidly growing number of smaller ones, were offering pop releases in both 45- and 78-rpm form, with sales of the latter dropping steadily as the decade progressed. As the 1960s dawned, the 78 was all but extinct in the U.S.
[1] Wallerstein, Edward (as told to Ward Botsford). “Creating the LP Record.” High Fidelity (Apr 1976), pp. 56–58, 60–61.
[2] Hunter had been part of the RCA team that developed Victrolac pressings in the early 1930s, which originally were intended as movie soundtrack discs. RCA engineer F. C. Barton first publicly disclosed the details at the spring 1931 meeting of the Society of Motion Picture Editors. As was disclosed in a 1935 RCA advertisement to the transcription trade, Victrolac was a form of vinyl manufactured by Union Carbide.
[3] Botsford, Ward. “From Transcription Disc to LP.” High Fidelity (Apr 1976), p. 59.
[4] Wallerstein, op. cit.
[5] Ibid. Wallerstein recalled having initially ordered EMI and Ampex recorders. However, as Ward Botsford points out in a footnote to Wallerstein’s article, Ampex did not introduce its first recorder until April 1948.
[6] CBS trademarked the LP name but failed to aggressively protect it. Eventually, it was determined that the term had slipped into generic usage, and CBS lost claim to it.
[7] Wallerstein, op. cit.
[8] Ibid.
[9] Botsford, Ward. “From Transcription Disc to LP.” High Fidelity (Apr 1976), p. 59.
[10] “Firm Sets Exhibit of New Records.” Salt Lake Tribune (Jul 11, 1948), p. 10.
[11] “Standard Yelps When Col. Cuts LPs from Ordinary Disks Sans Double Rate.” Billboard (Oct 9, 1948), p. 19.
[12] LeBel, C. J. “Microgroove in Your Studio. Part 2, Equipment Requirements.” Audio Record (Feb 1949), p. 3. Le Bel was vice-president of Audio Devices, Inc., a major supplier of blank recording discs and magnetic tape.
[13] “London Insists Shellac Is Live.” Billboard (May 6, 1950), p. 22.
[14] “U.S. Dragnet Snares Eight Philly Firms.” Billboard (Jun 10, 1950), p. 11.
[15] “Modern Adds 33 to LP Disk Line.” Billboard (Oct 28, 1950), p. 16.
[16] “Vox Waxery Hits LPs Heavy Next Mo.; 8–10 Disk Starter.” Billboard (Ap 30, 1949), p. 18.
[17] “Vox to Drop 78s, Use LP Exclusively.” Billboard (Nov 12, 1949), p. 18.
[18] “Concert Hall 1st Indie with LP.” Billboard (Jan 8, 1949), p. 14.
[19] “Mfrs. Hustle to Produce Combos Handling Different Speeds; Much Blueprinting.” Billboard (Feb 26, 1949), pp. 18, 115.
[20] “RCA’s New Phono System.” Billboard (Jan 3, 1949), p. 13.
[21] “Report on ‘Madame X,’ RCA Victor’s New 45 RPM Record.” Audio Record (Feb 4, 1949), p. 4.
[22] Cole, D. D. “The How and Why of RCA Victor’s New Record Player.” Audio Record (Mar 1949), pp. 1–3. Cole was chief engineer of the RCA Victor Home Instrument Department.
[23] These were phonographs that were equipped with special features (such as oversized spindles or a raised lug on the turntable) that prevented their use with standard records. Dealers sold them very cheaply, or even gave them away, knowing they would make their profit on the matching records. Details of these operations came be found in the author’s A Phonograph in Every Home (Mainspring Press).
[24] Program Transcriptions were the first 33 1/3-rpm discs made for the consumer market and could be played only on specially designed (and quite expensive) RCA phonographs. One of Edward Wallerstein’s first orders, upon his arrival at RCA, was that these money-losing products be discontinued.
[25] Cole, op. cit.
[26] “Capitol Records Out with 45 R.P.M. Music System in April.” Cash Box (Feb 19, 1949), p. 4.
[27] Capitol’s initial 45-rpm offerings were classical, using material licensed from Telefunken in Germany. Pop 45s were added later in the year, making Capitol the first company to offer the same material in all three speeds.
[28] “45’s for Rondo, Discovery Firm.” Billboard (Jan 7, 1950), pp. 11, 35.
[29] “RCA Sets 3-Speed Plans.” Billboard (Dec 10, 1949), pp. 14, 41.
[30] Ibid., p. 41.
[31] Wallerstein, op. cit.
[32] “Commerce Dept. Passes Buck on LP Plea to FTC.” Billboard (Dec 4, 1948), p. 23.
[33] “Seeburg Analyzes ‘45’ Disks — Believes Subject Vital to Industry’s Future.” Billboard (Dec 10, 1949), p. 15.
[34] Weiser, Norm. “Juke Makers Eye ‘45’ Wax; Availability Is Chief Factor.” Billboard (Dec 17, 1949), p. 17.
[35] Ibid.
[36] “All Tunes Appearing in ‘The Cash Box’ Charts to Show 45 RPM As Well As 78 RPM Disks as Juke Box B12 Swings Over to More and More 45 RPM Play.” Cash Box (Nov 25, 1950), p. 13.
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Copyright 2024 by Allan R. Sutton. All rights are reserved.
News from the DAHR Website
Edison Cylinder Listings Published
April 12th, 2024
By David Seubert
Revised editions of two important books documenting Edison cylinder recordings have been published by UCSB’s American Discography Project. Compiled by Allan Sutton and originally published by Mainspring Press, the new editions are now available as free downloadable eBooks.
Edison Two-Minute and Concert Cylinders: American Issues, 1897-1912 / Allan Sutton. (Second Edition: Digital Version 1.0; ISBN 979-8-9893331-4-1).
Edison Four-Minute Cylinders: Amberols, Blue Amberols, and Royal Purple Amberols: Domestic Issues, 1912-1930. / Allan Sutton. (First Combined Edition: Digital Version 1.0; ISBN: 979-8-9893331-5-8).
Edison Four-Minute Cylinders: Amberols, Blue Amberols, and Royal Purple Amberols includes an illustrated historical introduction, revised recording and/or release dates and recording locations from Edison archival materials; additional details on remakes, alternate versions, cancelled numbers, and direct-versus-dubbed issues; full personnel of vocal backing groups; plus newly added details on instrumental accompanists, band vocalists, conductors, arrangers, artist pseudonyms, uncredited performers, and medley contents; disc takes used in the production of dubbed cylinders, and data for the corresponding wax Amberol and Diamond Disc releases; and expanded listings for private and special-use recordings, including the Ediphone, Kinetophone, and Panama-Pacific cylinders, private issues for Thomas Edison and Henry Ford, etc.
In Edison Two-Minute and Concert Cylinders will be found the first study of these records to be compiled from the surviving company documentation (factory plating ledgers, studio cash books, remake and deletion notices, catalogs, supplements, trade publications, etc.), along with careful inspection of the original cylinders.
Unlike previously published guides, which don’t list the numerous remakes, this new volume shows all known versions (even indicating those initially supplied by Walcutt & Leeds), along with the listing or release dates and distinguishing details for each. Plating dates for brown-wax pantograph masters and early Gold Moulded masters, which provide valuable clues to the long-lost recording dates, are published here for the first time.
Other features include an illustrated, footnoted history of Edison cylinder production during the National Phonograph Co. period; detailed user’s guide, and artist and title indexes.
Originally published as three books between 2009 and 2015 and long out of print, these new editions have been revised and updated with new information based on examination of original documents and artifacts.
Funding for their publication as free eBooks was provided by the John Levin Early Recordings Fund and the William R. Moran Fund for Recorded Sound.
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The following is an except from the expanded second edition of A Phonograph in Every Home: Evolution of the American Recording Industry, 1900–1919, in preparation for release later this year.
My thanks to David Giovannoni for his diligent investigation of the Wonder, American Talking Machine, and American Vitaphone labels. Scans, sound files, and comparisons to the pirated source recordings can be found under those labels on the i78s.org website.
Record piracy [1] — the unauthorized copying and selling of sound recordings — has existed since the earliest days of the commercial recording industry. Until February 15, 1972, federal copyright protection did not exist for phonograph records. The Copyright Act of 1909 afforded protections to composers and publishers whose works were recorded, but explicitly exempted “mechanical reproductions” (in other words, the recordings themselves) from those protections. As a result, legitimate producers were left to prosecute piracy on other grounds, most often patent infringement or unfair competition. A reporter for The Music Trade Review observed in 1905,
Making “dubs,” that is, re-duplicating the disk records manufactured by the concerns who originated the “masters,” seems to be quite a business in itself, though not considered altogether reputable, and certainly not legitimate. … It is a question of whether the parties guilty of producing the spurious goods are not legally liable under the law of unfair competition. [2]
Any hope that the newly proposed Copyright Act would extend protection to sound recordings was quashed in 1906, when it became clear that it was intended to protect only composers and publishers, not the record companies themselves. As a result, the bill was staunchly opposed by recording industry officials, although Victor attorney Horace Pettit noted that his company might be more amenable to the proposal should copyright protection be extended to sound recordings:
If the talking machine companies are under this act to pay royalties to authors and composers on copyrighted compositions, the talking machine companies should also be protected, in this way: We might pay Mr. Sousa or Mr. Herbert or Mr. Caruso, or any of the opera singers, $1,000 for making a record. It is perfectly possible within the known arts for that record, after we make it, to be reproduced by a mere copper plating process by somebody else, and copied, so that we would pay $1,000 or so and have no protection against the person manufacturing a duplicate of it. Therefore, for that and other reasons, the talking machine manufacturers should be entitled to register the particular records which they prepare, and that provision should he included in the act. [3]
But Pettit’s argument fell on deaf ears. Ultimately, the bill as passed in 1909 required record companies to pay publishers royalties for use of their copyrighted compositions on records, but provided no copyright protection for the recordings themselves.
By then, record companies had been grappling with the problem of piracy for two decades. The ability to make one’s own recordings was an inherent feature and important selling point of the wax-cylinder phonograph, and from there it was just a short step from making original home recordings to making and selling unauthorized copies of commercial recordings. The basic supplies (two phonographs, a recording head, a supply of wax blanks, and some cylinders to copy) were readily available from any phonograph dealer. High-speed pantographs, which produced copies via a direct mechanical link to the “master,” are known to have been used in some of the larger cylinder-pirating operations. On the other hand, disc-record piracy — usually accomplished during this period by electroplating or pantographing commercial pressings to produce new stampers — required considerably more expertise as well as access to commercial plating and pressing facilities. However, the basic processes and formulations were well known, and were being employed in the production of illicit discs by the later 1890s.
Accusations of cylinder piracy were made as early as 1891. By the later 1890s, cylinder piracy was running rampant. In 1897, the Kansas City Talking Machine advertised “warranted original” cylinders for 50¢ each, half the usual going price at the time, leading The Phonoscope’s editor to speculate that they might be pirated copies. [4] Relatively little original documentation of cylinder-counterfeiting operations has survived. Most were clandestine businesses that either eluded detection or were shut down with little attendant publicity. However, an October 1901 report by Joseph P. McCoy, an industrial spy favored by Thomas Edison, offers a glimpse of one early pirating operation.
McCoy, on the pretense of wanting to record his own cylinders, called upon one Robert J. Roth in New York. Roth, McCoy reported, “told me that he could buy me a Duplicating Machine for about $100.00 and could get me blanks for from 6 to 7 cents apiece by the hundred.” After being passed from one questionable supplier to another, McCoy eventually found himself in the company of a Mr. Isaacs, who offered to sell him “a lot of records he had for 11 cents apiece and would guarantee 75% of them marketable and suggested that I take these records and sell them off first, then take them back from my customers in exchange for others and shave them off and make my own blanks in that way.” Isaacs also offered to sell McCoy the molds needed to make his own blanks “with a very simple formula in case I couldn’t get the proper wax. I could make these blanks with two-thirds portion Ivory Soap and one portion rosin.” The conversation then turned to the marketing of bootlegged cylinders:
I spoke to [Isaacs] about making records and selling them to department stores and he showed me some orders he had on file where he furnished Siegel-Cooper Co., Bloomingdale Brothers, and Joseph Bauland Co. of Brooklyn. He was supplying these in lots of 750 from 11¢ to 12¢ each. He said that he could furnish any of these stores as many as 1,000 a month and make good money on them at this price. (And by the way, Mr. Roth also told me in our conversation that he had furnished Bloomingdale and Siegel-Cooper Co. a great many records at 60% off list price). [5]
Cylinder piracy declined quickly after mass-produced molded records were introduced in 1902. Cylinder molding was a complex operation requiring a high degree of expertise and the use of proprietary, patent-protected equipment that was not available to small operators. Besides being complicated to produce, the new molded cylinders were louder and more durable than their predecessors’, and their technical superiority quashed demand for the primitive brown-wax cylinders the bootleggers produced.
McCoy uncovered one of the last known cylinder-pirating operations in March 1903. Doing business as the Dodin Record Company, it marketed poor-quality copies made on imported brown-wax Pathé blanks. [6] Edison sued the company for various patent violations, but locating the offenders proved difficult. The Dodins (who apparently were brothers) disappeared shortly after a preliminary injunction was issued; in their absence, notice was served on their mother. After the defendants failed to appear for trial, a pro confesso ruling was entered against them, and a final decree was prepared. Its issuance was deemed “not urgent, since defendant appears to have discontinued business.” [7]
Illegal disc copying was under way by the later 1890s. The earliest documented disc piracy on a commercial scale was carried out by inventor Joseph W. Jones. For a time, Jones had worked in Emile Berliner’s laboratory, where he was able to observe the disc-production process. After leaving Berliner, Jones applied for a patent on a coin-operated disc machine in 1897. Employing a feedscrew–driven reproducer, it did not infringe Berliner’s patent specification that the reproducer be propelled solely by the record’s groove. [8] On the strength of that filing, New York investor Albert T. Armstrong entered into an agreement with Jones in November 1897 under which Jones was to license his mechanical-feed phonograph to Armstrong and supply disc records for those machines. Soon after Jones’ patent was granted on March 3, 1898, the venture was incorporated as the Standard Talking Machine Company. [9]
Problems with record production arose almost immediately. Apparently unable to produce satisfactory masters at first, Jones resorted to copying commercial Berliner releases, retaining the original Berliner catalog numbers preceded by a “1.” Researcher David Giovannoni’s analysis of a surviving specimen, including comparison to the source Berliner recordings, offers conclusive evidence that the master was a pantographic copy, rather than an electroplated copy as had previously been thought. [10] Jones did indeed invent a disc pantograph, although he did not get around to filing a patent application on the device until early 1902.
Although Joseph W. Jones did not file a patent on this disc-copying pantograph until January 1902, he almost certainly employed this or a similar device in making his pirated masters from Berliner Gramophone pressings. (U.S. Patent and Trademark Office)
The pirated records were marketed for use on the Wonder Bell, a twin-horn phonograph manufactured by the Conn Instrument Company. Wonder Bell’s 1898 catalog listed hundreds of obviously pirated Berliner recordings, but there were also scattered titles for which no Berliner equivalent is known to exist, which might represent Jones’ earliest attempts at recording his own masters. Unfortunately, examples of these isolated instances have not been located for analysis.
Labeled Wonder Record, and crediting the Standard Talking Machine Company, the seven-inch embossed-label discs were pressed in a red fibrous compound that was a marked contrast to Berliner’s black shellac. They were on the market by the spring of 1898, advertised as “indestructible records, made by a new process.” [11] Berliner sued for patent infringement in June 1898, and Standard Talking Machine suspended operations a short time later.
Nearly all of the records listed in this 1898 Wonder Record catalog bear the same numbers as Berliner Gramophone discs, preceded by a “1” (i.e., Wonder Bell 192 corresponds to Berliner 92). As researcher David Giovannoni has pointed out, this extensive catalog “was probably aspirational rather than operational.”
Armstrong and Jones rebounded quickly. They launched a second venture in the autumn of 1898, this time operating as the American Talking Machine Company. Unlike Jones’ previous venture, this one enjoyed legal protection under license from the American Graphophone Company (Columbia), which was attempting to break into the disc market. Columbia agreed to manufacture Jones’ disc machines provided that Jones could supply satisfactory disc records, which he did in 1899. [12] Sold under the American Talking Machine Record Disk label, the seven-inch discs were pressed in the same fibrous red material as the earlier Wonder Records.
The American Talking Machine records no longer bore Gramophone-based catalog numbers, although Jones continued to pirate Berliner material. Thus far, David Giovannoni has conclusively identified ten issues using masters pantographed from Berliner discs. However, he has also located four recordings, all by Dan W. Quinn, that are obviously original Jones masters — three credit the American Talking Machine Company in the spoken announcements and the fourth, although unannounced, has the same characteristics as the announced masters. He has also located four American Talking Machine discs using masters of uncertain origin.
In September 1899, Emile Berliner declared (with only partial justification, as the evidence above shows) that American Talking Machine discs were pirated from his recordings. The accusation drew a sharp response from American Talking Machine officials, who offered a $1,000 reward for the arrest and conviction of “parties circulating false and malicious statements” about their products. [13] The manager of Berliner’s Philadelphia office was arrested at one point, further escalating hostilities. [14]
Accepting Berliner’s claim at face value, The Phonsocope reported, “The red disks advertised by this company are copies of regular Gramophone records and considering that they are quadruplicates from the original they are not half bad, if all are as good as those our representative heard.” [15] Although the extreme rarity of American Talking Machine records makes it impossible to ascertain the proportion of pirated to original recordings, it is clear that pirated Berliner recordings, including at least one of British origin [16] , were now being intermixed with Jones’ original wax masters. [17] This would be consistent with the company’s claim that it was operating a recording studio on Third Avenue in New York.
Jones certainly was capable of producing acceptable original masters by then. In October 1899 it was reported that he was about to depart for London, Paris, and Madrid, where he would make recordings for the foreign markets. [18] Further evidence of Jones’ ability to make original recordings is found in the sworn affidavit of musician Charles Rech, who recalled having made records for Jones’ slightly later Vitaphone label with a band directed by Otto Schreiber. [19]
American Talking Machine’s master sources became a moot issue in April 1900, when Columbia suddenly withdrew its patent protection for the company in favor of the Universal Talking Machine Company, effectively putting an end to the operation. Its last known advertisement appeared in The Phonoscope‘s October 1900 issue (some contents of which suggest it actually was published in December), but Armstrong would soon resurface with his American Vitaphone Company. In the absence of Jones, it would be largely a pirating operation.
Berliner would see his discs pirated again, this time more openly, by the Universal Talking Machine Company for use on their new Zonophone machines. Frank Seaman’s National Gramophone Company (Universal’s sales agent) originally sold Berliner products, but by the end of 1899 Berliner was refusing to fill most of Seaman’s orders as legal sparring escalated between the Gramophone and Zonophone interests. In the meantime, Seaman had begun marketing unbranded seven-inch discs that bore more than a passing resemblance to Berliner’s, for use on the Zonophone. [20] The stampers were electroplated from commercial Berliner pressings, with Berliner’s trademark and patent information neatly effaced, but the original Gramophone catalog numbers and other markings left intact. [21]
Any doubts that these were pirated from the Berliner discs were dispelled by former Zonophone salesman Frederic MacLean, who in a 1900 affidavit declared that he had seen “a large number of matrices made from the commercial records of the Berliner Gramophone Company” in the offices of the National Gramophone Company, “part of these matrices still having on them the patent marks and titles and names of the artists. The other matrices had these patent marks and names erased.” [22]
Advertisement for a Zonophone disc pirated from Berliner, with the Berliner Gramophone logo and patent notice effaced but retaining the original Berliner catalog number and other markings.
It was also obvious that the Duranoid Manufacturing Company, which pressed Berliner’s Gramophone discs, was not the source of these pressings. Duranoid employee William Gwinnell testified that the pirated records were not “as bright and brilliant” as the genuine object and possessed “a recess at the side of the center hole” that was never present on pressings made for Berliner. [23] Furthermore, Gwinnell noted that the Berliner matrices were secured at the Duranoid plant, to which no employee of the Universal Talking Machine Company had ever been given access. [24]
Still, Frank Seaman refused to concede that the records he was marketing were pirated. On the contrary, he considered the masters to be his personal property, since it was he, rather than Berliner, who had engaged and paid the performers. [25] That claim was refuted, at least in part, after some discs submitted as evidence in Seaman vs. Johnson were proved to have been pirated from masters recorded for Berliner by Eldridge Johnson, who had paid the performers. [26]
Circumstantial evidence suggests that the availability of Universal Talking Machine’s pirated pressings undermined sales of genuine Berliner discs in 1899. Berliner’s annual disc sales had been growing at a healthy rate since the mid-1890s, and there was every expectation that they would continue to do so in 1899. Instead, they inexplicably declined from 1898’s level. [27] Universal Talking Machine’s pirating activities continued into at least the summer of 1900. [28] By then, however, the company had begun to produce original Zonophone recordings in its own studio, under the management of John C. English, eliminating the need to rely on pirated material.
For a time, it looked as if Universal Talking Machine itself might be a victim of outright counterfeiting. In the autumn of 1903, it was discovered that Morris Keen, David Keen, and Benjamin Futernik (doing business in Philadelphia as Keen Brothers & Company, and the Keen Talking Machine Disc Record Company) were selling what were thought to be counterfeit embossed-label Zonophone records, at half the price of genuine pressings. [29] Unlike the earlier pirated recordings, these appeared to be unaltered copies, identical in every way to the genuine item. In filing for an injunction, Universal president John A. McNabb suggested the stampers might have been made by electroplating commercial Zonophone pressings:
I am informed that the Defendants have on hand something like 100,000 records containing the word Zonophone thereon… . Such number of records were never sold by this Complainant to these Defendants, nor could these Defendants have ever received any such number of records of Complainant, without Complainant’s knowledge. … The said records have been made without any license from this Complainant to use the word Zonophone, from this Complainant’s matrices, as the infringing records herewith produced are evidently copies of Complainant’s records, it being quite possible by known process to produce a matrix from a commercial record… . [30]
But that would not turn out to be the case. By November, the source had been identified as the Auburn Button Works, Zonophone’s own pressing supplier. The records were found not to be counterfeits, but genuine embossed-label Zonophone pressings that Universal had returned to Auburn as unsalable after introducing its new paper-labeled Zonophone discs. Auburn, without the knowledge or authorization of Universal officials, disposed of them to H. A. Caesar & Company (a dealer in discounted and remaindered merchandise), which sold approximately ninety cases of the records to the Keens. [31] On December 23, 1903, a preliminary injunction to prevent further sales was served on the Keens, who simply ignored it. They eventually were found in contempt and fined $300 plus court costs. [32]
Emile Berliner and Eldridge Johnson both experimented with anti-piracy measures, although not very successfully. Berliner discs exist on which the end of the spoken announcement slightly overlaps the start of the performance, a strategy also employed in Europe by the Anglo-Italian Commerce Company and some other early producers. The foreign Berliner operations briefly attempted to thwart copying by faintly embossing their trademarks across the playing surface. Some Berliner pressings made during 1900 in England and Canada show the “Recording Angel” and “His Master’s Voice” trademarks in the playing areas — the latter being the first appearance of that trademark on a record. The practice probably did discourage electroplating by devious operators, but it also added to the discs’ already troublesome surface noise and was quickly discontinued. Several years later, the Berlin-based International Talking Machine Company began inserting short sections with an altered groove pitch on some of its masters, which served as an easily visible watermark that did not affect playing quality.
Albert Armstrong was back in business by late 1901, sans Jones and now operating as the American Vitaphone Company. [33] His new venture initially dealt in legitimate Victor and Zonophone products in connection with a new idea — a record club. As an inducement to join the club, Armstrong ran an exchange program under which customers could receive credit toward new records when they turned in old ones, or could obtain a new Victor phonograph for $12 and the exchange of an “old-style” Berliner Gramophone. [34] But Armstrong also marketed his own 7″ paper-labeled American Vitaphone Records. The catalog was a mixture of pirated Columbia, Victor, and Zonophone material, with a smattering of Jones’ original American Talking Machine recordings (some of which were simply surplus ATM pressings with new paper labels affixed). Although intended mainly as premium-scheme bait, the records were also sold outright by some retailers, including Harry Hardesty & Company, the Victoria Talking Machine Company, and the E. J. Morgan Bluing Company (all three of which were owned by Hardesty, who had close ties to Armstrong).
These American Vitaphone discs show the catalog numbers of the Columbia issues from which they were pirated. Columbia 1676 was released in January 1904, confirming that American Vitaphone was still a going concern at that point.
From the start, there was absolutely no doubt the records were pirated. Electroplated from commercial pressings, the American Vitaphone labels, and sometimes the pressings themselves, showed the original manufacturers’ catalog numbers. The Victor Talking Machine Company finally took legal action in 1904, charging Armstrong with pirating its records as well as infringing its recently approved red-label trademark. [35] But with a court date looming, Victor officials were unable to locate Armstrong or any trace of his Vitaphone operation at the various addresses given, as secretary Arthur Middleton testified:
Company made diligent effort to secure the address of the said Armstrong and of the said American Vitaphone Company, and had a man especially employed for the purpose, but was unable to find the said Armstrong and the said American Vitaphone Company, as [both] were moving from place to place. [36]
With Armstrong finally tracked down, depositions were taken in late August 1904, and the trial commenced in September. Among some less-than-reputable witnesses for the defense was Winant Van Zant Pearce Bradley, whose Talk-O-Phone Company had recently been sued by Columbia for patent infringement, and who offered nothing substantive in his deposition. Armstrong claimed the Vitaphone records were never sold, but were just given away in premium schemes. He was contradicted by one John Everett, who testified that he had purchased Vitaphone discs outright at two of Harry Hardesty’s stores. Everett noted that Hardesty’s clerks had misrepresented the discs as “Red Seal” records, [37] supporting Victor’s contention that Vitaphone’s use of a red label was causing confusion in the minds of consumers and tarnishing the Victor Red Seal’s prestigious image. Samuel H. Rous, a Victor studio manager and jack-of-all-trades, testified that his microscopic comparison of a Victor record and its pirated Vitaphone counterpart proved conclusively that the recordings were from the identical source. [38]
Citing unfair competition, Judge Lacombe granted a preliminary injunction on October 4, 1904. [39] The injunction was made permanent several weeks later, and a formal cease-and-desist order was served on November 5. Armstrong died soon after the order was served, and a planned appeal was abandoned. [40] In November 1905, the American Express Company sold the remaining unclaimed American Vitaphone property at public auction.
American Vitaphone had been a fairly well-publicized operation, and its vanquishing seems to have discouraged further domestic pirating activities, if only temporarily. By November 1908, the problem had once again become so serious — particularly in regard to pirated Red Seal records — that Victor dispatched a circular sternly warning dealers against purchasing what it termed “dubbed records.” [41]
The chief offender was the newly launched Continental Record Company. Incorporated in New Baltimore, New York, on September 28, 1908, Continental was the latest in a string of shady ventures connected with Winant V. P. Bradley. [42] As a former officer of the Ohio Talking Machine and Talk-O-Phone companies, and sales agent for the International Record Company — all ventures that blatantly infringed key Columbia and Victor patents — Bradley was no stranger to the courts.
Bradley’s announcement of Continental records included the spurious claim that the company had the legal right “to so reproduce” other producers’ records.
Continental pirated commercial Fonotipia and Victor recordings by some of those labels’ leading operatic celebrities. Regular commercial pressings were electroplated to produce the stampers, from which the Fonotipia and Victor markings were rather clumsily effaced. Speculation that the records were pressed offshore proved to be incorrect. Bradley later testified that the pressings were American-made, although he did not disclose the manufacturer. The Auburn Button Works seems the most likely source, based on physical characteristics of the discs, Bradley’s earlier affiliation with Auburn’s International Record Company subsidiary, and the fact that Auburn was in need of a new pressing client following IRC’s forced closure the previous year.
Whatever the source of Continental’s pressings, they could be purchased for substantially less than the records from which they were copied. With no artists to be paid or studios to be maintained, Bradley was able to offer the records for as little as 60¢ each, approximately one-quarter the price of the originals (he would later insist that 60¢ was just the wholesale price, claiming they retailed for double that amount — a price that still undercut the original records’ by a substantial margin). [43] Continental’s labels and sales materials made the surprisingly frank disclosure that each disc was “a duplicate of an original record,” a move that Bradley apparently saw as affording him legal protection. Some discs bore reverse-side labels stating that they were for use only on mechanical-feed phonographs, a ploy that had already failed International Record and others in their unsuccessful attempts to skirt patents on lateral-cut recording.
This rare Continental “forecast of a catalog” included recordings pirated from Fonotipia (shown here) and Victor.
Victor officials were aware of Bradley’s pirating operation as early as November 25, 1908, when general manager Louis Geissler warned distributors not to handle the records. [44] Columbia officials apparently first became aware of the Fonotipia piracies in January 1909, after Bradley approached a record dealer named Fernandes with an offer to sell him cut-rate Continental records by major operatic celebrities. [45] Recognizing them as Victor and Fonotipia recordings (the latter being legally imported and sold by Columbia at the time), Fernandes purchased several and forwarded them to Victor and Columbia headquarters, where careful aural and physical inspection confirmed they were copies. The Edisonia Company also turned over eighteen Continental records to Victor officials for inspection in January 1909. [46]
Attempts to locate Continental’s place of operation were foiled at every turn. Suspicions had been aroused as early as December 1908, when New York Talking Company salesman Virginius Moody took it upon himself to visit New Baltimore (where Continental Record claimed to be headquartered), only to discover that no one there had heard of the company or any of its incorporators. Moody managed to track one of the listed supposed officials to a Manhattan address, only to discover that the individual had no connection to Continental. Other New York Talking Machine employees also failed in their attempts to locate Continental’s office and factory. [47] Moody then paid a visit to Bradley, who refused to divulge the company’s address and warned that all further attempts to deal with the company would have to go directly through him. [48]
In February 1909, Victor dispatched Frederick Blount to Continental’s supposed New York City address, at 147 W. 35th Street, which proved to be that of the Herald Square Storage Company. Unable to gain entrance, Blount reported that the building was apparently unoccupied, in a state of “uncleanliness,” and showed no signs that Continental had a presence there. [49] Albert Middleton, in preparing Victor’s case against Continental, had to settle for identifying the defendants as “Winant V. P. Bradley and others who are conspiring and confederating with him, whose names are unknown at this time to the complainant, as they are manifestly attempting to conceal their identity.” [50]
With evidence mounting that the Continental Record Company was a fictitious entity, Fonotipia and Columbia officials filed a bill of complaint against Bradley himself on February 1, 1909, seeking a temporary injunction and restraining order on grounds of unfair competition. [51] Horace Pettit, Victor’s legal counsel, took similar action against Bradley two weeks later. [52]
There was no doubt that the Continental masters had been electroplated from commercial pressings. Columbia recording manager Victor Emerson testified,
The Continental records are more scratchy and less pleasing to the ear than the corresponding Columbia [Fonotipia] records, but in other respects the execution is identical for each pair. … I unhesitatingly state my expert opinion that each Continental aforesaid and the corresponding Columbia record were obtained from the same original execution by the singer; and that each Continental record is a duplicate obtained from an identical specimen of the corresponding commercial Columbia disc record. [53]
Victor recording expert James W. Owen stated that a Continental record by Antonio Scotti was undoubtedly pressed using a stamper electroplated from a Victor pressing, based upon his microscopic comparison of the two versions. Victor spared no effort in making its case, submitting depositions from artists whose records had been pirated (including Scotti and Emilio de Gogorza) and a host of company employees, executives, and expert witnesses.
In his defense, Bradley submitted a twenty-two page affidavit that began with a rambling summary of recording-industry case law as he saw it, including citations of fifty-five legal cases with which he claimed to be familiar. [54] He did not deny that he was making duplicates from other companies’ records, but claimed he had a right to do so because (among other reasons) some pressings he had electroplated had been purchased from the Canadian Berliner company, which he incorrectly maintained had pirated those very recordings from Victor. [55] Bradley’s claim that the pirated records were equal in quality to the originals was easily dismissed. An examination of the records during the course of the trial led U.S. Circuit Judge Thomas Chatfield to observe that the Continental pressings did not show “the use of as good material in the discs, nor as much durability and freedom from warping as those of the complainants, and a comparison shows in many instances a dulling or far-away effect.” [56] Inundated with affidavits and depositions, Judge Chatfield declared in June that he would delay delivering his opinion to allow time for careful consideration. [57]
A proposed consent decree, served on Bradley on August 9, elicited a startling response. Refusing to acknowledge the decree, Bradley countered with a proposal under which he would be allowed to continue conducting business as usual, provided only that he stop advertising the records as being “duplicates” of equal quality to the originals. Columbia attorney Philip Mauro, in particular, was having no part of it:
Defendant asks to be permitted to continue to pirate our specially executed sound-records, putting out his counterfeit records without giving anyone credit for executing the same, and implying that defendant himself made the record start to finish. And, it would seem to follow from his contentions that, if he could succeed in improving the quality of his output, he could in that case truthfully (and lawfully) advertise that they are copies of ours and as good as ours. Defendant’s form of decree would imply that a poor imitation of the genuine article is unlawful, while a perfect imitation is lawful; that an inferior workman is a wrong-doer while a clever copier is free to pursue his counterfeiting. [58]
The verdict finally came in September, when Judge Chatfield ruled that the Continental operation amounted to unfair competition:
The defendant, Winant V. P. Bradley, has caused copies or duplicates or counterfeits of complainants’ said specially executed sound records to be made…and has thereby unfairly availed himself of complainants’ property, and has to that extent diverted to himself the legitimate business which should and otherwise would go to complainants, to the injury of complainants’ said business and good will. [59]
Permanent injunctions were served prohibiting Bradley and his associates from engaging in any further such activities. They were followed by an order for accounting, with costs and damages to be paid by Bradley, and any profits to be distributed among the complainants. After Bradley declined to appeal, federal marshals were sent to seize all Continental pressings, stampers, and related materials in his possession. [60]
Although the injunction in the Continental case had a chilling effect on U.S. pirating activities, foreign pirate labels like Efraín Band’s Disco Aguila continued to flourish. The example pictured here was copied from a Victor recording by Enrico Caruso.
Continental would be the last significant American pirating operation until the 1940s. (Opera Disc, which flourished briefly in the 1920s, was not a pirate operation as has often been alleged; its producer owned the masters legally, but not the right to sell those recording outside of Germany.) Nevertheless, pirated records continued to find their way into American consumers’ hands through clandestine channels. The trade papers suggested the pressings were coming from unnamed Asian manufacturers, but no firm evidence of that was forthcoming. More likely sources were South America and Russia. The International Excelsior Record Company, for example, specialized in pirating Gramophone Company recordings by prominent Russian performers in the early 1900s. [61] Its Excelsior Concert Record labels claimed offices in Moscow, London, and Chicago. No evidence of a Chicago office has been found in advertisements or city directories of the period, but the records surface in the U.S. with sufficient frequency to suggest that at least some were sold here.
The largest and boldest of the foreign pirating operations was owned by Efraín Band, an otherwise legitimate record producer. Band operated his own studio and pressing plant in Buenos Aires, Argentina, but he also pirated American and European recordings with abandon for at least two decades, by artists ranging from Enrico Caruso to Paul Whiteman’s Orchestra. [62] He was particularly fond of Columbia, Victor, Fonotipia, and Gramophone Company material.
Like Bradley, Band produced stampers by electroplating commercial pressings. He left the original markings intact at first, but later took pains to efface them. The records were marketed in South America under an array of labels, including Disco Aguila, Fonografía Artística, Mignon, Mundial, Royal, and World. Band’s products are not known to have been legally exported to the United States, although circumstantial evidence suggests he might have been behind the obscure Pan-American label, which pirated Red Seal recordings and was sold here very briefly.
Back in the United States, the ruling in the Continental case served to discourage would-be record pirates as well as legitimate companies that might be tempted to provide services. In December 1922, an unnamed party approached Harry Pace, the producer of Black Swan records, with a proposition that Pace’s plant press records from masters “made by Caruso himself in Germany.” (Since Caruso never recorded in Germany, the reference almost certainly was to Victor or Gramophone Company masters held by Deutsche Gramophon, which had recently been enjoined from selling those recordings under the Opera Disc label in the U.S.) [63] Pace wisely declined, writing to Black Swan backer W. E. B. Du Bois that he did so “for fear of legal entanglements with the Victor Company who are too powerful to start any scrap with.” [64] However, Pace apparently was overruled by his new business partner, John Fletcher. Some of the pirated masters were pressed by the Fletcher–Black Swan plant for the obscure Symphony Concert label, which vanished quickly from the market.
Record piracy re-emerged in the mid-1940s, this time as outright counterfeiting. Facilitated by the proliferation of small independent dubbing services and pressing plants eager for any sort of business, shady operators were now copying the original labels to produce what appeared to be legitimate pressings, which were peddled at discount prices. That activity will be the subject of an upcoming article.
[1] “Pirating,” as used in this chapter, is distinct from “counterfeiting,” in that the latter attempts to duplicate all attributes of the copied item, including the label name and design, catalog numbers, and (often) markings in the wax. The copied recordings discussed in this chapter are piracies rather than counterfeits per se, having been released under labels other than those from which they were copied.
[2] “Decision on Reduplication.” Music Trade Review (Apr 15, 1905), p. 42. The Talking Machine World and other trade papers indiscriminately applied the term “dubbing” (which technically is the transfer of sound from a playback mechanism to a recording mechanism by various acoustic or mechanical means) to any illegally copied record. Other than some of the early Jones discs, the pirated recordings discussed in this chapter were not dubbed, but rather, were pressed from stampers obtained by electroplating commercial pressings.
[3] “Protests of Provisions of New Copyright Bill.” Talking Machine World (Jun 1906), p. 21.
[4] “Answers to Correspondence.” Phonoscope (Aug–Sep 1897), p. 9.
[5] McCoy, Joseph P. Untitled document (Oct 25, 1901). Edison National Historic Site (ENHS).
[6] Hayes, Howard W. Letter to William E. Gilmore (Mar 27, 1903). ENHS.
[7] Edison Phonograph Co. vs. Dodin & Dodin. U.S. Circuit Court, New York (initial filing Jan 1903).
[8] Jones, Joseph W. “Sound Recording and Reproducing Instrument.” U.S. Patent #600,315 (filed Mar 13, 1897; issued March 8, 1898).
[9] This company was not related in any way to the later Chicago-based Standard Talking Machine Company, which marketed legally modified Columbia products for use in premium schemes.
[10] Giovannoni, David. “Armstrong and Jones Pressings” (unpublished spreadsheet and text, in e-mail to the author, Jan 19, 2024).
[11] “Descriptive Catalogue, Wonder Bell Talking Machine” (undated). Researcher Ray Wile estimated the publication date as c. March 1898, based on known recording dates for the corresponding Berliner discs.
[12] In the end, Columbia did not manufacture any Jones machines, but turned production over to one or more smaller manufacturers.
[13] “$1,000 Reward.” Phonoscope (Oct 1899), p. 5.
[14] “Trade Notes.” Phonoscope (Oct 1899), p. 11.
[15] “Trade Notes.” Phonoscope (Sep 1899), p. 11. Note that actual Phonoscope publication dates at this time generally were two months after the stated cover date.
[16] American Talking Machine Record Disk #1800, an anonymous mandolin and guitar rendition of “March from Rice’s Ragtime Opera,” has been tentatively identified as a piracy of the Musical Avolos’ May 1899 British Berliner recording.
[17] Giovannoni, David. E-mail to the author and others, re comparison of Jones and Berliner products (Dec 24, 2021).
[18] “Trade Notes.” Phonoscope (Oct 1899), p. 11. Jones is described as having “charge of the record laboratory of the American Talking Machine Company.” His departure date was given as Jan 27, 1900 (see note 13 concerning cover-versus-actual Phonoscope publication dates).
[19] Rech, Charles. Affidavit (Jan 27, 1904), in Victor Herbert vs. Universal Talking Machine Manufacturing Co. (Supreme Court, State of New York).
[20] Berliner Gramophone Co. Complaint in Berliner Gramophone Co., Appellant, vs. Frank Seaman, Appelle (May 16, 1901). U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Fourth Circuit, No. 412.
[21] Eldridge Johnson was aware of this practice at the time, testifying in December 1900 that the American Record Company, National Gramophone Company, and Universal Talking Machine Company purchased commercial pressings from Berliner for 50¢ each, which they copper-plated them to produce stampers (Johnson, Eldridge R. Affidavit No 1, in Frank Seaman vs. Eldridge R. Johnson. U.S. District Court, E.D. Pennsylvania (Oct 1900 Sessions, No. 20).
[22] MacLean, Frederick C. Affidavit (Sep 3, 1900), in Frank Seaman vs. Eldridge R. Johnson, op. cit.
[23] This refers to the so-called Valiquet notch, a shallow circular depression molded into the discs’ blank reverse sides, meant to engage a pin on the Zonophone turntable. It was named for Louis Valiquet, designer of the early Zonophone machines.
[24] Gwinnell, William B. Affidavit (Aug 14, 1900), in Frank Seaman vs. Eldridge R. Johnson, op. cit.
[25] Frank Seaman vs. Eldridge R. Johnson, op. cit.
[26] Ibid.
[27] Wile, “The American Graphophone Company and the Columbia Phonograph Company Enter the Disc Record Business, 1897–1903.” ARSC Journal (Fall 1991), p. 212.
[28] The Metropolitan Orchestra’s Berliner recording of “Impecunious Davis” (#0967, pictured in this work) was made on February 15, 1900, and subsequently pirated by the Universal Talking Machine Company for use on its Zonophone machines. Given the confirmed recording date, the original Berliner record probably was released in April, at the earliest. Allowing for the additional time needed to produce Universal’s new stampers and pressings, it is unlikely that the pirated version could have been ready for sale earlier than June 1900.
[29] Morris Keen would be no stranger to the courts, finding himself frequently in trouble over alleged patent infringements in his phonographs. He went on to launch the Keenophone Company, which legally produced its own original recordings in vertical-cut format, in 1912.
[30] McNabb, John A. Deposition in Universal Talking Machine Manufacturing Co. vs. Morris Keen, David Keen, and Benjamin Futernik. (No. 32, In Equity. U.S. Circuit Court, E.D. Pennsylvania).
[31] Universal Talking Machine Manufacturing Co. vs. John H. Woodruff, the name “John” being fictitious, Defendant’s real first name being unknown to Plaintiff, and “John Doe,” the name “John Doe” being fictitious, Defendant’s real name being unknown to Plaintiff, co-partners doing business under the firm name of The Auburn Button Works (New York Supreme Court, New York County). The wording is puzzling, given that John H. (Hermon) Woodruff was not a fictional name, but a well-known industrialist and founder of Auburn Button Works.
[32] Universal Talking Machine Manufacturing Co. vs. Morris Keen, David Keen, et al. Circuit Court, E.D. Pennsylvania (Mar 24, 1905).
[33] According to Armstrong’s deposition in the 1904 Victor lawsuit, the American Vitaphone Company was incorporated in South Dakota, with New York listed as its principal place of business. Testimony from Armstrong, and from American Vitaphone manager Clinton Repp, points to October 1901 as the company’s likely start of operations.
[34] “Grand Holiday Offer Limited to 30 Days” (American Vitaphone Co. advertising broadside and record list, Dec 1902).
[35] Victor Talking Machine Co. U.S. Trademark application #42,962 (filed June 9, 1904).
[36] Middleton, Albert C. Deposition (Aug 24, 1904), in Victor Talking Machine Co. vs. Albert T. Armstrong, et al. (In Equity #8838). U.S. Circuit Court, S. D. New York.
[37] Everett, John B. Deposition (Aug 24, 1904), in Victor vs. Armstrong, op. cit.
[38] Rous, Samuel H. Deposition (Aug 24, 1904), in Victor vs. Armstrong, op. cit. In addition to working in Victor’s recording department, Rous recorded prolifically under the name of S. H. Dudley (appropriated from a Black vaudevillian and theatrical entrepreneur of the same period, who never recorded). Rous later managed the cataloging department and wrote the early editions of The Victor Book of the Opera.
[39] Victor vs. Armstrong et al., op. cit. (Oct 4, 1904).
[40] “Decision on Re-Duplication.” Talking Machine World (Mar 1905), p. 11.
[41] “Warning Against ‘Dubbers.’” Talking Machine World (Dec 1908), p. 30.
[42] “New York Incorporations.” New York Times (Sep 29, 1908), p. 12. Directors at that time were said to be Benjamin I. Carhart, E. O. Goodell, and J. C. Cady, Jr., all of New York, with an office in New Baltimore, New York. Bradley (whose name does not appear in the incorporation notice) misrepresented his role with the company as solely that of a sales agent.
[43] Bradley, Winant V. P. Deposition (Mar 2, 1909), in Fonotipia Limited and the Columbia Phonograph Co. (General) vs. Winant V. P. Bradley (In Equity #5-92). U.S. Circuit Court, E.D. New York.
[44] Geissler, Louis F. “To All Victor Distributors and Dealers — Warning” (letter, Nov 25, 1908). Edison Papers (Edison National Historic Site).
[45] Fernandes, P. D. Affidavit (Jan 30, 1909), in Fonotipia and Columbia vs. Bradley, op. cit.
[46] Petit, Albert. Affidavit in Victor Talking Machine Co. vs. Winant V. P. Bradley (Feb 15, 1909). In Equity #5-94. U.S. District Court, E.D. New York.
[47] Beekman, Chester C., John J. Cavanaugh, et al. Affidavits (Feb 1909), in Victor vs. Bradley, op. cit..
[48] Moody, Virginius W. Affidavit (Feb 11, 1909), in Victor vs. Bradley, op. cit.
[49] Blount, Frederick A. Affidavit (Feb 16, 1909), in Victor vs. Bradley, op. cit.
[50] Middleton, Albert C. Affidavit (Feb 16, 1909), in Victor vs. Bradley, op cit..
[51] “Suit Brought Against Bradley.” Talking Machine World (Feb 1909), p. 47.
[52] Pettit, Horace. Bill of Complaint (Jan 16, 1909), in Victor vs. Bradley, op. cit.
[53] Emerson, Victor H. Affidavit (Feb 16, 1909), in Fonotipia & Columbia vs. Bradley, op. cit.
[54] Bradley, Winant V. Z. Depositions (Mar 2, 1909), in Fonotipia & Columbia vs. Bradley and Victor vs. Bradley, op. cit.
[55] The Victor recordings were not pirated, having been legally licensed by Victor for Canadian release by Berliner. Elsewhere, Bradley claimed a right to pirate recordings that had been produced or purchased in foreign countries, declaring that they were not protected under U.S. law.
[56] Chatfield, Thomas I. (Aug 7, 1909), in Fonotipia & Columbia vs. Bradley, op. cit.
[57] “‘Dubbing’ Suit Developments.” Talking Machine World (Jun 1909), p. 27.
[58] Mauro, Philip. Complainants’ Memorandum Upon Settlement of Decree (Aug 27, 1909), in Fonotipia & Columbia vs. Bradley, op. cit.
[59] “Signs Decree in ‘Dubbing’ Case.” Talking Machine World (Sep 1909), p. 45.
[60] “No Appeal Taken in ‘Dubbing’ Suit.” Talking Machine World (Oct 1909), p. 9.
[61] Despite the suspiciously similar names, no connection has been found between this company and the New York–based International Record Company, which produced the unrelated Excelsior label employing strictly local talent.
[62] Escobar, Francisco Garrido, and Renato D. Menare Rowe. “Efraín Band y los Inicios de la Fonografía en Chile [Efraín Band and the Beginning of the Production of Phonograph Records in Chile].” Revista Musical Chilena (Jun 2014), pp. 52–78.
[63] A detailed account of the Opera Disc case will be found in the author’s Recording the ’Twenties (Mainspring Press).
[64] Pace, Harry H. Letter to W. E. B. Du Bois (Dec 23, 1922). Special Collections and University Archives, University of Massachusetts–Amherst. As a major investor in Black Swan, Du Bois was kept well-apprised of matters relating to the company; see “Revisiting Black Swan: The Documented History” on this site.
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Compiled by Allan Sutton
from the Edison Dealers’ Order Sheets
.
(From the Raymond R. Wile Research Library)
The following artists were the top sellers on new releases made during the height of the Edison Gold Moulded cylinder’s popularity, based upon the initial dealer-order reports of 1906 through mid-1908. The most popular, by far, were Ada Jones (who captured the top three spots, as a soloist and in duets with two different partners), Len Spencer, and Billy Murray. It’s interesting to note that as soloists, Murray ranked only #12, followed by Spencer at #13; but paired with Jones, both landed in the top two spots.
Some caveats:
(1) The figures are only for initial dealer orders. Some of these records remained in the catalog for long periods, and the final total sales figures have not survived, nor have statistics for returned or scrapped copies that would have lowered these totals somewhat. However, most sales to dealers occurred in advance of and immediately following the initial release date, so these figures serve as a good indicator of a records’ relative popularity.
(2) The list covers only artists on new releases of the period. Some top-selling artists, like Cal Stewart, don’t appear here because Edison didn’t issue any new records by them during this period (although many of their earlier releases were still in the catalog and, in Stewart’s case, apparently selling quite well). Several other very popular artists, including Billy Golden and Murry K. Hill, are not represented here because they made so few Edison Gold Moulded recordings that the sample size is insufficient to establish a reliable ranking. Both made the top-seller list (as did Stewart) with their new releases during the Amberol and early Blue Amberol periods, which will be covered in a future post.
(3) There is strong evidence to suggest that many record buyers of the period were more interested in a given song than in the artist who recorded it. Artists who made a weak showing might have done so, at least to some degree, because they weren’t assigned the current popular material. It’s interesting to note, however, that two performers in the top ten — Charles D’Alamine and John J. Kimmel — specialized in the tired old traditional fare personally favored by Thomas Edison and a significant portion of his customer base.
| Artist(s) | Average Initial Order | |
| 1 | Ada Jones & Len Spencer | 44,076 |
| 2 | Ada Jones & Billy Murray | 42,261 |
| 3 | Ada Jones (solo; see also #1 and #2) | 40,384 |
| 4 | Edison Vaudeville / Minstrel Company | 38,767 |
| 5 | Frank C. Stanley & Byron G. Harlan | 38,186 |
| 6 | Arthur Collins & Byron G. Harlan | 37,957 |
| 7 | Charles D’Almaine | 37,831 |
| 8 | John J. Kimmel, as “John Kimmble” | 36,944 |
| 9 | Steve Porter | 36,717 |
| 10 | Manuel Romain | 35,530 |
| 11 | Haydn Quartet, as “Edison Male Quartet” | 35,095 |
| 12 | Billy Murray (solo; see also #2) | 34,794 |
| 13 | Len Spencer (solo; see also #1) | 34,494 |
| 14 | Frederick H. Potter | 34,306 |
| 15 | Albert Benzler | 34,002 |
| 16 | Helen Trix | 33,968 |
| 17 | John Young & Frederick J. Wheeler, as “Anthony & Harrison” | 33,389 |
| 18 | S. H. Dudley | 33,223 |
| 19 | Byron G. Harlan (solo; see also #5 and #6) | 33,161 |
| 20 | Stella Tobin | 32,832 |
| 21 | Vess L. Ossman | 32,761 |
| 23 | Arthur Collins (solo; see also #6) | 32,346 |
| 24 | Edward Meeker | 32,183 |
| 25 | Edward M. Favor | 32,048 |
| 26 | Bob Roberts | 31,889 |
| 27 | Will F. Denny | 31,537 |
| 28 | James Brockman | 31,334 |
| 29 | Reinald Werrenrath | 31,290 |
| 30 | Harry Macdonough | 30,384 |
| 31 | Reed Miller | 30,283 |
| 32 | Edison studio bands / orchestras | 29,865 |
| 33 | Henry Burr, as “Irving Gillette” | 29,078 |
| 34 | J. W. Myers | 28,259 |
| 35 | Joe Belmont | 28,236 |
| 36 | Will H. Thompson | 28,147 |
| 37 | Frank C. Stanley (solo; see also #5) | 27,854 |
| 38 | Florence Hinkle | 27,829 |
| 39 | John Young, as “Harry Anthony” (solo; see also #17) | 27,178 |
| 40 | Allen Waterous | 27,142 |
The poorest-selling artists? Those on the Gold Moulded Grand Opera cylinders, with initial orders averaging only 1,100–1,250 copies.
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© 2024 by Allan R. Sutton. All rights are reserved.
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New York: May 24, 1923
Victor 19084 (mx. B 28026 -2)
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New York: May 24, 1923
Victor 19084 (mx. B 28027 -2)
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Like Noble Sissle, with whom he was associated off-and-on for many years, Wendell Talbert was largely a creature of the theater. Unlike Sissle, he left behind only a handful of issued recordings, and only in an accompanying role. As a result, he’s been largely overlooked by collectors and historians.
The earliest substantive reference we’ve found to Wendell Phillip (or Philips, depending on the account) Talbert shows him as a member of the Southern Jubilee Singers and Players in January 1912. This was a traveling organization that specialized in old-time “plantation” songs, traditional spirituals, and other fare that likely was selected at least in part for its appeal to white audiences.
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Talbert as tenor, cellist, and pianist with the Southern Jubilee Singers and Players (Bismarck [North Dakota] Tribune, January 27, 1912)
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By 1914, Talbert was a featured performer with William A. Hann’s Jubilee Singers, a group of “seven cultured ladies and gentlemen” whose offerings ran from “refined and wholesome humor” to spirituals and grand opera. Its members included soprano Florence Cole, who Talbert married in the same year. At about that time, Noble Sissle joined the troupe, initially filling in for Talbert on occasion, based upon some published programs from the period. Their paths would continue to cross for the next four decades.
.Wendell Talbert and Florence Cole-Talbert with Hann’s Jubilee Singers (Hutchinson [Kansas] Gazette, October 17, 1914)
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The Talberts divorced at some point, although the date remains unclear. One secondary source cites 1915, but news reports as late as 1917 continued to state that the couple were married. The latest such report we’ve located so far, in the Xenia [Ohio] Daily Gazette for May 24, 1917, refers to Cole-Talbert’s “talented husband, Prof. Wendell Talbert.” However, she continued to use Cole-Talbert as her professional name, perhaps leading to some confusion in the press.
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Florence Cole-Talbert is remembered primarily for her Black Swan recordings. She and Wendell had divorced by the time those recordings were made, but she continued to use her married name in stage work.
Ross Laird’s Moanin’ Low (Greenwood Press) and some other discographies incorrectly claim that Cole-Talbert was the same artist as Flo Bert. The latter was a white vaudeville comedienne who was one-half of the team of Brendlar & Bert, and was pictured in some Puritan phonograph publicity photos.
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Talbert appears to have left Hann’s company in 1918 or 1919, when mentions of him vanish from the press. At some point in the early 1920s, he made the transition from old-time tunes and spirituals to jazz and blues, albeit of a rather tame sort. In July 1921, it was reported that he would be writing for the Chamberlain Company, a newly launched music publisher in Detroit. Anecdotal reports credit him with coming up with the name for Sissle & Blake’s “Shuffle Along,” and conducting the pit orchestra in one of the show’s touring companies, but those stories remain to be confirmed.
In 1923, Talbert resurfaced as the piano accompanist on a few records by vaudeville-blues singers Rosa Henderson (Victor) and Lethia Hill (Vocalion). His two recordings with Henderson were released in Victor’s first attempt at a race-record series:
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Victor’s first attempt at a race-record series, July 1923. Sissle’s and Talbert’s sessions were held a day apart. Sissle by this time was a major star, and it’s tempting to speculate that he might have arranged for Talbert to record for Victor.
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By late 1925, Talbert had remarried and was touring in vaudeville with his Chocolate Fiends, a large revue that starred Alethia Hill. In November of that year, he accompanied two sides by comedian Billy King on Okeh. His orchestra made a test recording of “Deep Henderson” for Brunswick of October 28, 1926, which unfortunately was not approved for issue.
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Talbert and company on the road (Indianapolis, December 1925)
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Talbert remarried in 1926 and publicly credited new wife Hallie for her help and inspiration. He continued to tour with the Chocolate Fiends into the late 1920s, but made no further issued recordings that we know of.
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Pittsburgh Courier (October 9, 1926)
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Pittsburgh Courier (September 15, 1927)
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In the early 1930s, Talbert returned to his roots with his Dusky Troubadours, a choir that specialized in the same sort of material he had performed with Hann’s Jubilee Singers two decades earlier. The group broadcast over radio station WOR (Newark, New Jersey) on occasion. By 1934, Talbert had augmented the choir with an eighteen-piece orchestra.
Talbert with the USO during World War II (Louisville Courier-Journal, September 24, 1944)
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During World War II, Talbert served as musical advisor to the Colored USO of Central New Jersey. In July 1950, Talbert rejoined Noble Sissle, probably for the last time, in a fund-raiser for the New York Heart Association. He died in the early 1950s.
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Article ©2024 by Allan R. Sutton. All rights are reserved.
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In 1896, comedian Russell Hunting was arrested and jailed for selling “obscene” phonograph records. [1] The message was not lost on other performers, nor on the record companies. Commercial recordings would remain largely free of anything smacking of “obscenity” in the four decades that followed Hunting’s arrest.
Under federal law, any materials deemed obscene were prohibited in the mails. Otherwise, censorship of phonograph records was left largely to local governments, law-enforcement officials, and self-appointed moral guardians like the New York Society for the Suppression of Vice. During the 1920s there were record-smashing parties in Salt Lake City, and in Baton Rouge the mayor ordered the removal from stores of any “vulgar or indecent” records. [2] In 1925, police officials in Washington, D.C. decided to enforce an old statute prohibiting “indecent music,” whether it had lyrics or not. What one Washington attorney termed “that hootchy-kootchy sort of intonation” could be sufficient to establish indecency. Rhoda Milliken, a district police sergeant, took it upon herself to declare that saxophone music was immoral. [3] Her boss, Lieutenant Mina Van Winkle, even found American Indian music to be indecent. She took “that tom-tommy sort of Oriental music that makes men forget home and babies” to be a particular threat:
The desert natives play that sort for dancing, but they have self-respect enough to dance by themselves. They would be shocked to see the way our boys and girls hug each other and vibrate to the tune of those compelling pieces. [4]
One has to wonder how many youths were “vibrating” to, or were even aware of, American Indian music in 1925. A writer for the music trade journal Presto wondered if Ms. Van Winkle might be a practical joke foisted upon the public by a D.C. correspondent. She was not. [5]
The record companies had long been self-censoring. The occasional “cussing song” found its way onto records in the early 1900s (“The Whole Damm Family,” “Oh, Helen!”), and mildly suggestive lyrics like “How Could Red Riding Hood Have Been So Very Good (And Still Keep the Wolf from the Door)” were common in the 1920s. They generally were taken in stride by all by the must prudish. Vocal blues were sometimes quite suggestive, but being largely sequestered in the segregated race-record lists, they tended to escape notice in the mainstream market. When complaints did surface, Vocalion responded by advertising its line (none too honestly) as “The Cleaner Race Records.”
As far as can be determined, no “adult” record labels were produced commercially until the early 1930s, when Dwight Fiske launched Fiskana. Fiske, who studied piano at the Paris Conservatory, began his career as a concert performer. By the late 1920s was performing his own mildly risqué songs and monologues at private parties and in upscale lounges. Fiske was the picture of respectability, and his prissy, stilted performances were rarely anything more than mildly suggestive.
Fiske’s first issued record was made in 1933 by Byers Recording Laboratory, a small New York producer of radio transcriptions and custom labels. Privately issued and barely advertised, it attracted little attention. He quickly shifted production of his label to RCA Victor, which apparently had no qualms about working with him — an indicator of just how tame his material was (and perhaps, how desperate RCA was for work of any sort at that time). RCA produced Fiskana as a client label from 1933 through early 1937, and even numbered the records in its own 36000 series. Although the RCA Victor name and trademarks never appeared on the labels, at least one dealer advertised them as Victor records.
(Top) An RCA-produced Fiskana record and one of Fiske’s Liberty Music Shop releases. (Bottom) Although RCA did not allow its name or logo to appear on the Fiskana labels, the records were given Victor catalog numbers and sometimes advertised by dealers as regular Victor releases.
Fiskana records were targeted to a fairly sophisticated, affluent clientele. Marketing was handled by Mayfair Features (named for the Mayfair Yacht Club, at which Fiske was performing) and the records were sold by some well-respected dealers, albeit rather discreetly. Among them was publisher Robert M. McBride, who also operated a record shop in Hollywood. In 1936, McBride published a collection of Fiske’s stories in book form, as “Why Should Penguins Fly?” [6]
A writer for the H. Royer Smith Company, a major Philadelphia retailer, touted an early Fiskana release without acknowledging that his company was handling the line:
They tell us that a phonograph record with a rather unattractive green label is taking the Smart Set of New York by storm. The fat dowagers simply explode…the “ladies” of Park Avenue giggle and blush…the female impersonators go into hysterics…the “old smoothies” bite their cigars in half. … The title of this “wow-of-a-record,” of which thousands of copies, or was it millions, have been sold to all the “smart people” in gay New York at $1.50 each, is Fiskana. [7]
Approximately thirty titles were issued before Fiske and RCA parted ways. Fiske later had his own pressings made from the RCA masters, from which Victor’s telltale “VE” logo was effaced. He went on to record six sides for the Liberty Music Shop label in 1939, then became a staple on the less respectable Gala label in the 1940s. He continued to record into the early LP era, never venturing beyond the tired double entendres and occasional mild expletive.
Album cover for a set of Dwight Fiske’s Liberty Music Shop records,
c. mid-1930s.
If Dwight Fiske didn’t fit the stereotype of a party-record producer, Ray Bourbon certainly did. An alcoholic and flamboyant female impersonator who had frequent run-ins with the law, he sometimes went by the alias Hal Waddell or Richard F. Mann. [8] Bourbon worked in vaudeville before moving to the gay nightclub circuit, beginning with New York’s Pansy Club, in late 1930. From there, he moved on to a string of underground West Coast nightspots that showcased female impersonators and openly gay performers in material that far exceeded what could be safely presented in the burlesque houses. Local authorities became alarmed as the clubs began to proliferate. In 1932 the Los Angeles police raided Bourbon’s “Boys Will Be Girls” revue, which succeeded only in driving it to San Francisco. [9]
Bourbon made two test recordings for Brunswick in October 1929, but he was not signed. A second Brunswick test session, in March 1931, went no better. With no other potential takers, he finally launched his own Bourbana label in 1935. Produced by the Western Record Company in Hollywood, Bourbana records were a modest underground hit. Some of the recordings were licensed to other early “adult” labels, including Hot Shots from Hollywood and Good-Humor, and in later years many were pirated by less reputable producers. The Liberty Music Shop released four of its own rather tame Bourbon sides, recorded for them by Decca, in 1936. A second batch of Liberty Music Shop releases followed in 1940, this time recorded by Reeves Sound Studios. In the meantime, Bourbon had launched his own Imperial Record Company.
Album cover for a Ray Bourbin set on his Imperial label. Imperial’s end came in 1942, after Eli Oberstein launched his own Imperial Record Company.
Unrelated to the later rhythm-and-blues label, Imperial was a shadowy business for which no incorporation or other legal documents have been found. Based on Bourbon’s own claim, the company must have begun operations in or around 1937. The titles became a bit more suggestive — “My Ace in the Hole,” “Take a Lei,” “Gland Opera” — although the content remained relatively innocuous. The label’s end came after Eli Oberstein launched his own Imperial Record Company in 1942, apparently unaware of Bourbon’s minuscule operation. Bourbon placed a notice in Billboard in December, claiming to have operated his Imperial Record Company “for five years,” [10] but both parties ended up abandoning the name. Bourbon was soon back in business with The New Bourbon Records labels.
(Left) Ray Bourbon’s early eponymous label was distributed by Robert McBride, who also published Dwight Fiske’s books. (Right) Bourbon discontinued his Imperial label after Eli Oberstein launched a similarly named company.
Bourbon performed with Mae West in the 1940s, but his career faltered as his behavior became increasingly bizarre. In 1956 he officially changed the spelling of his first name to “Rae” (which he had first used in 1929, for his Brunswick test) after claiming to have undergone a sex-change operation in Mexico. He claimed that his surgeon had discovered uterine tissue during the course of the operation [11]. The tale was generally assumed to have been fabricated (as would be proved later), and Bourbon continued his downward spiral. On February 21, 1970, he was convicted as an accomplice to murder, following a botched attempt to remove his dogs from a kennel by force, during which one of his accomplices killed the kennel owner with Bourbon’s gun. Bourbon was sentenced to ninety-nine years in the men’s prison at Big Spring, Texas, where he died in July 1971. [12]
With the way now opened by Dwight Fiske and Ray Bourbon, several specialty labels decided to take a chance with mildly risqué “adult” material. The most active was Liberty Music Shop, a well-respected niche label that catered to what Billboard characterized as “the plush record-buying trade.” Its roster included cocktail-lounge pianists, salon orchestras, white “chamber jazz” groups, and Broadway headliners, but there was also some riqué material by Bourbon, Fiske, Nan Blakstone, and Stoughton J. (“Bruz”) Fletcher.
The Liberty Music Shop’s “adult” stars included Bruz Fletecher, whose own label (top left) appears to have been produced for him by John McClelland’s Novelty Record operation. The son of a prominent Indiana banker, he committed suicide in February 1941. Nan Blakstone recorded for Decca and other mainstream labels, reserving her more provocative fare for niche labels like Liberty Music Shop.
Hazard Reeves’ General Records also issued some party material, mostly novelty tunes like the Three Old Roosters’ “Who Slapped Annie in the Fanny with a Flounder?” and “Biggest Kanakas in Hawaii.” The party material was largely limited to General’s Tavern Tunes label, which was intended for the jukebox trade. For the most part, however, mainstream producers preferred to steer clear of questionable material, leaving the field open to newcomers.
The most prolific of the new party-label producers was John Collins McClelland. A well-known Los Angeles entrepreneur, McClelland controlled thousands of jukeboxes and other coin-operated entertainment devices through his National Amusement Company. He also owned several side-businesses with ties to National Amusement, some of which appear to have been little more than shell corporations. Among them was the Los Angeles–based Novelty Record Distributors, a.k.a. Novelty Record Company. Launched in 1935, it released “adult” material under the Hot Shots from Hollywood label. [13] McClelland lived large, even installing a private bar adjacent to his office that was decorated with paintings of life-size nudes and said to be a popular gathering spot for others in the jukebox trade.
“Pure and Simple”: The Nudist Colony
Hollywood, CA: 1936
Hollywood Hot Shots 372
Milton Swanstrom was recruited as McClelland’s sales manager. His previous employer had been the Rock-Ola Manufacturing Company, one of several jukebox operations that had recently taken a strong stance against party records. [14] Perhaps not coincidentally, David Rockola declared after Swanstrom’s departure,
I feel that the use of suggestive songs and questionable ‘ditties’ is jeopardizing the good, clean, well-established and well-thought-of legitimate business of the music operator. People can be very modern and liberal and still dislike to take their wives and children where they will unconsciously and unintentionally be compelled to hear ribald words on a phonograph record. [15]
The Hot Shots from Hollywood discs initially were sold only to jukebox operators, with the same selection pressed on both sides. Unlike many later party labels, they were professional productions, recorded at the Associated Cinema Studios in Hollywood and pressed by the Allied Record Manufacturing Company, which had taken over Columbia’s former Los Angeles pressing plant. Early releases featured Cliff “Ukulele Ike” Edwards, a stage and radio star of the 1920s whose career was foundering. The records were only mildly suggestive and apparently did nothing to sully Edwards’ reputation. He would go on to voice the character of Jiminy Cricket for Walt Disney.
The Hot Shots records were an immediate hit with local jukebox operators, and by 1936 they were being sold nationally. In August, Billboard reported that Midwestern distribution was being handled by the firm of Gerber & Glass (a large supplier to jukebox operators), which was “swamped with orders.” [16] Production lagged far behind demand. Although Milton Swanstrom reported “increasing business” on October 8, the company managed to ship only 806 records that week. [17]
Hollywood Hots Shots was the first in a line of “adult” labels produced by John McClelland. The address given was that of McClelland’s National Amusement Company. The recordings would soon begin showing up on other Hollywood-based labels, like Racy Records.
In December 1936, McClelland — noting that demand for the Cliff Edwards’ records was still exceeding production capacity — announced a new approach for Novelty Record Distributors that “broadens the field and places it in the diversified class, using name singers and orchestra.” [18] Among them were Ben Light, John “Candy” Candido (of the popular duet, Candy & Coco), and Cleo Brown (a pop-blues singer and frequent guest on Bing Crosby’s and Jimmy Dorsey’s 1930s radio programs). McClelland even retained the team of Mac Maurada and Mac McGreevy as house lyricists. [19]
Billboard described the material as “new and distinct types of songs never before recorded [that] give the patron a big laugh in addition to beautiful and rhythmic dance music.” [20] Brown recorded five titles for Hot Shots in late 1936, including “Is Jenny Getting Any Anymore?” and “Who’ll Chop Your Suey?” They were no more suggestive than some of the songs Ethel Waters, Bessie Smith, and other blues singers had recorded in the late 1920s, but they still managed to raise hackles in some quarters. There were many issues by an impromptu jazz-inflected group labeled the Hollywood Hooters, and Ben Light contributed such titles as “Her Fuller Brush Man” and “Stick It–Shove It–Stuff It” with his Surf Club Boys.
Gladys Bentley, whose recording career began in the 1920s, was featured on McClelland’s Hot Shots records before launching her own label around 1939. “The Locksmith” was a later, anonymous (and most likely pirated) reissue of her “Lock and Key.”
McClelland eventually overcame his production problems, and in 1937 he moved into the consumer market, shortening his label’s name to Hollywood Hot Shots in the process. Now with a different selection on each side, the records were advertised to the general public as “The Life of the Party — Recorded in Hollywood with that ‘Hollywood Touch.’” Generally kept behind the counter, they retailed for $1.25 each, [21] nearly four times the price of a popular mainstream label like Decca or Vocalion.
McClelland’s masters soon began showing up on a group of obscure party labels that were clustered in the Los Angeles area. They were credited to Amusement Record Distributors, Hollywood Specialty Recordings, and other shadowy operations, which appear to have been nothing more than offshoots of, or aliases for, Novelty Record Distributors. New arrivals included Torchies from Hollywood and Racy Records, both of which got their start by reissuing McClelland’s Hot Shots sides. Despite the reclining semi-nude (and later, fully nude) model on the labels, Racy Records generally promised much more stimulating content than they actually delivered. Good-Humor, an obscure label with more tenuous ties to McClelland, retailed for $2.50 per record, ensuring its quick failure.
In New York there were the Radio and Novelty labels (the latter unrelated to Novelty Record Distributors), which offered some mild double-entendre material by comedian Ben Samberg, masquerading as “Benny Bell.” Billboard dismissed them as “innocuous…simple and silly.” Even producer Eli Oberstein got into the act. Oberstein, who proclaimed the beginning of “the double-entendre era” to a Time magazine reporter, launched the Party Record Company in New York in 1939. [22] In February 1940, Oberstein claimed that the biggest hit to date on his Varsity label was Johnny Messner’s suggestive “She Had to Go and Lose It at the Astor,” which reportedly had already sold 150,000 copies. Oberstein also claimed sales of 75,000 copies for the follow-up, “She Really Meant to Keep It till She Married,” and said he was thinking about releasing “I’m a Virgin, But I’m on the Verge.” [23]
Inevitably, there was a backlash from that those who demanded that “obscene” records be banned, particularly on jukeboxes. Among them was columnist Earl J. Morris, who urged the removal of all “filthy records” from jukeboxes. “Children drop nickels to hear these tunes,” Morris warned. “These songs glorify depravity.” [24] Bowing to public pressure, states and municipalities began acting to outlaw the sale and use of party records.
Efforts to quash the party-record menace had so far been mostly local. Massachusetts passed a law mandating a one-year prison term and/or $500 fine for anyone “who uses or causes or permits to be used…a phonograph or other contrivance, instrument, or device, which utters or gives forth any profane, obscene, or impure language.” [25] One William Nevin, after receiving a suspended sentence in Boston for possessing obscene records, asked that they be returned, only to be informed that the police would be keeping them. [26] In Miami, the names of those arrested for stocking jukeboxes with forbidden records were reported to the appropriate jukebox distributors, who sent warning letters to the offenders. [27]
Under growing pressure to address the situation, the federal government finally launched an investigation into the records and their producers in late 1937. It was claimed that mail shipments of obscene records had increased by sixty-three percent over the previous fiscal year, and civic and religious groups were demanding federal intervention to stem the tide. [28] Pressure was coming as well from jukebox manufacturers, who filed a complaint with the Justice Department. The United Press reported,
They reportedly told the department that salesmen peddling the “smutty records” sold them to establishments which “sandwiched” the risqué pieces in with respectable recordings. The companies complained the records gave their machines a “black eye.” [29]
Ultimately, the Justice Department handed the matter over to the Post Office, which had the power to investigate those suspected of sending pornographic materials through the mail. John McClelland, it would turn out, was a person of particular interest. The investigation was made public on January 4, 1938. [30]
John McClelland (center) and unidentified others, in the private bar that he constructed adjacent to his office in 1935.
Four days later, McClelland was arrested aboard an ocean liner in Honolulu harbor, bound for Australia. McClelland claimed that he was on vacation and was not attempting to elude prosecution in Los Angeles, [31] where a federal commissioner’s warrant had been issued charging him with using the mails to transport obscene recordings. [32] McClelland, it was alleged, had manufactured approximately 60,000 such records and was mailing 4,000 advertising circulars per month, which themselves were said to be obscene. [33] He was taken off the ship and escorted back to Los Angeles to appear before a federal grand jury. [34]
None of the commercial party-record offerings of the 1930s were truly pornographic, even by the prudish standards of the day. Most amounted to little more than sniggering adolescent humor, punctuated by the occasional expletive. The handful of unabashedly obscene recordings that circulated during the decade were mostly blank-labeled dubbings from rejected test pressings that somehow managed to escape from several major record companies.
The American Record Corporation, which seems to have been particularly lax in that regard, let slip a test pressing from a rejected alternate take of Lucille Bogan’s “Shave ’Em Dry.” One of the few 1930s recordings that still cannot be broadcast over the public airwaves, it begins, “I got nipples on my titty big as the end of my thumb” and gets considerably more graphic from there.
Lucille Bogan (anonymous): Shave ’Em Dry
New York: March 5, 1935
Unbranded 78-rpm record
Pirated dubbing from unissued ARC mx.16972 – ?
Another ARC escapee was an unlisted test of Gene Autry’s “Bye Bye Cherry” containing such lines as “Put your ass against the wall, here I come, balls and all.” Numerous examples of Bing Crosby’s studio profanity also found their way into circulation; so many, in fact, that by the early 1950s there was a party label devoted to them, named Crosby Blows His Top.
With jukebox suppliers and operators taking much of the blame for spreading such material, the Automatic Music Operators Association passed an ordinance in 1939 prohibiting the use of “obscene” records on jukeboxes. By 1940 some party record labels carried notices prohibiting jukebox use, a gesture that amounted to little given the lack of any enforcement mechanism. In the same year, members of the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (Local 737) got into the censorship business by refusing to install or service jukeboxes containing “objectionable” records. [35]
(Left) Launched in the late 1930s or early 1940s, the Party Record Company was one of the more respectable operations; it was acquired by Musicraft in 1943. (Right) Label notices forbidding use of party records on jukeboxes did nothing to stem the practice.
The American Society of Composers, Authors & Publishers joined the fray in 1940, issuing a statement condemning writers and publishers of “salacious and suggestive songs.” In December of that year, three offending ASCAP members were called before the directors and threatened with possible fines, suspension, or expulsion from the organization. Radio censorship was stepped up as well. NBC reported that it had placed 147 songs on its blacklist, 137 of which could not even be performed as instrumentals because their titles were considered suggestive. [36]
Increased policing dampened the party record business in the late 1930s and early 1940s, but it took World War II to bring production of the records to a near-standstill. With little or no access to rationed shellac, and much of their clientele serving in the military, most party-records operations shut down.
When record production resumed after the war, a new sort of party-record industry emerged that released some truly pornographic material. At the end of 1946 the New York Society for the Suppression of Vice seized hundreds of party records, and notice was given that similar raids were being planned for other cities. [37] Such actions only served only to drive the business farther underground, resulting in party records appearing with no artist and manufacturer credits, and sometimes not even a label brand name. Shadowy labels and companies proliferated, and piracy became widespread, as a new market developed for the records in LP and 45-rpm form.
In 1950 Congress moved to officially ban the importation and interstate shipment by common carrier of what were considered to be “obscene” records. [38] It was to no avail. For better or worse, adult records were here to stay.
Notes
[1] “Arrested a Bad Voice — Comstock Hunted It Across the Continent and Back Again.” New York World (Jun 26, 1896).
[2] “The Trends of the Times.” Talking Machine World (May 15, 1926), p. 11.
[3] “Our Moaning Saxophone Is Now Called Immoral.” New York Times (Sep 13, 1925), p. SM2.
[4] “Will Bar ‘Indecent’ Music.” New York Times (Jul 31, 1925), p. 32.
[5] “May Can the Can-Can.” Presto (Aug 15, 1925), p. 25. Van Winkle (1875–1932) led the Women’s Bureau of the District of Columbia’s Metropolitan Police Department of the from 1919 until her death.
[6] “Books and Writers.” Honolulu Advertiser (Nov 22, 1936), p. 33. In 1939, McBride and Fiske were the subject of a defamation suit brought by one Phillip H. Pratt, who claimed he had been libeled and slandered by the use of his name in Fiske’s “Coney Island Honeymoon.” (“Suit Calls Song Risque.” Brooklyn Citizen, Dec 12, 1939, p. 5).
[7] Untitled article. The New Records (Dec 1933), p. 1
[8] “Ray Bourbon Goes ‘Clean-Up’ Route.” Billboard (Nov 18, 1944), p. 29. Bourbon disclosed this information in his 1944 bankruptcy filing. One biographer has stated that Waddell was Bourbon’s birth name, without citing a source.
[9] “Coast Raid on Panzee Joints.” Variety (Oct 4, 1932), p. 52. According to undocumented reports, the revue was raided again in San Francisco. One of the raids supposedly was broadcast over live radio, but the details (even including the year, which appears in various accounts as 1932 or 1933, with no source cited) vary widely.
[10] “Ray Bourbon Records, Owns and Operates Imperial Records” (ad). Billboard (Jan 17, 1942), p. 24.
[11] “Ray Bourbon’s Switch in Sex Allegiance; Now He’s a She — A Mexican Standoff.” Variety (May 23, 1956).
[12] “Rae Bourbon, a Protégé of Mae West, Dead at 78.” New York Times (Jul 22, 1971), p. 36.
[13] “P. O. Inspectors Nab Record Distributor.” Oakland [CA] Tribune (Jan 15, 1938), p. 3.
[14] “Mrs. Swamstrom Is Buried.” Billboard (Nov 14, 1936), p. 76.
[15] “Music Operators Again Cautioned.” Billboard (Dec 26, 1936), p. 124.
[16] “Paul Gerber Leaves for Coast.” Billboard (Aug 8, 1936), p. 73.
[17] “Los Angeles.” Billboard (October 24, 1936), p. 87.
[18] “Los Angeles.” Billboard (Dec 5, 1936), p. 79.
[19] “Endurance Shows.” Billboard (Ocotber 24, 1936), p. 28.
[20] “Paul Gerber Leaves,” op. cit.
[21] “Hollywood Hot-Shot Records.” Undated sales flyer (c. 1937–1938).
[22] “Music: Mr. Big.” Time (Feb 19, 1940). Time online archive (www.time.com).
[23] “Music: ASCAP Against Smut.” Time (Mar 25, 1940). Time online archive.
[24] Morris, Earl J. “Grand Town Day and Night.” Pittsburgh Courier (Jul 15, 1939), p. 20.
[25] “Cite Law Against Obscene Records.” North Adams [MA] Transcript (Sep 21, 1937), p. 14.
[26] Asks Return of Evidence by Which He Was Convicted.” Fitchburg Sentinel (May 1, 1938), p. 7.
[27] “Smutty Records.” Miami News (Nov 24, 1937), p. 1.
[28] “Investigate Traffic in Obscene Phonograph Records.” Catholic Advance (Feb 5, 1938), pp. 1
[29] “U.S. Starts Probe of Risqué Records.” Pittsburgh Press (Jan 4, 1938), p. 5.
[30] Ibid.
[31] “Man Held Here for L.A. Federals.” Honolulu Advertiser (Jan 11, 1938), pp. 1, 2.
[32] “Pornographic Record Seller Seized Here.” Honolulu Advertiser (Jan 11, 1938), pp. 1, 4.
[33] “Investigate Traffic,” op. cit.
[34] “Obscene Record Defendant to Sail.” Honolulu Advertiser (Jan 15, 1938), p. 4.
[35] “Juke Trade Leaders Decry Use of Smutty Disks, Scoff at Raid.” Billboard (Dec 14, 1946), pp. 3–4
[36] Ibid. The members’ names were not disclosed.
[37] Ibid.
[38] “Rapid Action on Record Bill Is Seen.” Billboard (Jan 21, 1950), p. 13.
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© 2024 by Allan R. Sutton. All rights reserved. Unauthorized reproduction, distribition, and/or alteration of this article in any form and by any means, including but not limited to AI harvesting, is prohibited.
A preliminary version of this article appeared in the author’s Recording the ’Thirties (Mainspring Press, 2011), a revised and expanded edition of which is in preparation.
Although Peter Goldmark took credit for developing the Columbia LP, most of the actual work was carried out by William Bachman and other CBS and Columbia Records staffers. This previously unpublished interview (conducted in Ithaca, New York, on Friday, October 28, 1977) sheds new light on the introduction of a product that changed the course of the commercial recording industry.
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How did you and Dr. [Peter] Goldmark divide your work on the Columbia LP project?
Well, we didn’t, really. Peter was so involved in television [development] that he essentially turned over the LP to me. He was senior to me, of course, so it was his project and I was his collaborator, but he asked me to run the LP development on a day-to-day basis.
To what extent was Mr. [William S.] Paley involved in the LP project?
Not at all until it came time to introduce it publicly. Mr. Paley was never that interested in the Columbia Records division. Visionary that he was, he knew that whichever company came up with the best color television system would dominate that industry. He knew that RCA was working on a color system, and nothing gave Bill Paley more gratification than beating General [David] Sarnoff to the market with the best possible system.
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Although Peter Goldmark took credit for the LP, the actual development work was carried out by William Bachman and other CBS and Columbia Records staffers.
Do you know whether General Sarnoff was involved in the 45 r.p.m. system that RCA Victor introduced after your success with the LP?
I don’t want to say that Columbia and RCA had “spies,” but the engineering end of the commercial recording industry is not really that big, so it’s never that hard to find out some information—not all, but some—about what the competition is up to. Now, I will admit that our two companies put out “junk rumors” every once in a while, just to get a rise out of the other [company]—but that was a waste of time because the engineers could tell in a heartbeat whether a rumor had any substance to it.
What was your impression of the RCA Victor 45 when you first heard one?
Well, they marketed a complete system, just as we did with the LP. But the RCA 45 system was more complicated from a design standpoint because they had to develop a turntable with a changer that would operate faster than any 78 turntable operated. They were able to do that because the 45 disc was a vinyl compound and therefore was unbreakable, so their turntable could change discs very fast compared to the standard 78 ones, because there was no risk of the disc that was being dropped onto the turntable would crack or break.
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Columbia’s LP-player attachment (originally manufactured for Columbia by Philco Radio) was often discounted or given away with record purchases. That practice, along with Columbia’s decision to make the new format freely available to other labels, helped to quickly popularize the LP. (January 1949)
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I gather that RCA’s rapid changer was meant to give the consumer the impression that for classical-music recordings, the new changer would work so fast that the time lapse between the disc on the turntable and the one being dropped into place would be minimal.
That was a big part of RCA’s promotion—that and the fact that they had a stable of artists who were the top singers, instrumentalists, and symphony orchestras on their Red Seal label. And RCA really pushed that promotional angle when they introduced the “EP,” or “Extended Play” version of the 45. But we had the LP before RCA had the 45, and we also had Mitch Miller and [RCA] didn’t. Mitch Miller created more careers of pop singers than you could count, and they were all on our label. We ended up with our share of the great conductors and orchestras too, and we also had Lily Pons and some other great opera singers, but the classical market was never much when you looked at it from a return-on-investment standpoint. The classical market was a prestige thing, but it never accounted for more than ten or maybe fifteen percent of [Columbia’s] revenue.
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Ads for RCA’s competing 45-rpm system stressed Victor’s stable of top pop and classical stars. Ultimately, the 45 was trounced by the LP in the latter category, but triumphed in the pop field as a replacement for the 78-rpm single. (July 1949)
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When you began the LP project, did you go back to the RCA Victor long-playing discs of the early 1930s?
No, never. Those Victors were a complete failure, you know. There wasn’t anything new about them, even when Victor launched them. Maybe the grooves were a little bit narrower than the regular 78s that RCA was putting out. But there was nothing new about the speed because 33-1/3 r.p.m. was already the standard for cutting [radio] transcription discs and also for the old Vitaphone discs. So there was nothing new about the speed. And the playback stylus specs were the same that Victor’s 78 players had in those days.
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“A stale joke in the industry” — RCA’s failed 33-1/3 rpm Program Transcriptions of the early 1930s. (December 1931)
Thanks for clarifying that. Occasionally, there are still some rumblings that the Columbia LP was sort of “inspired,” for the lack of a better word, by the Victor long-playing discs of 1932.
Those Victors were already a stale joke in the industry, so we would have been wasting our time if we had started by going back to them. But I will admit that we did pay a lot of attention to an earlier long-playing record, the one that Edison had developed in the mid-1920s. Do you know about those Edisons?
Yes, but I’ve never actually seen or heard one.
Let me tell you, those records were a masterpiece of engineering. And not just in the lab, but in their commercial form. I got two of those thick, long-playing discs from a friend of mine who collected old records. They were vertical-cut records, like everything Edison put out. And they were recorded acoustically, not electrically. The groove specs were almost unbelievable when we put them under a microscope and had them measured. Now remember, we were cutting the LP with a 1/200-inch groove. But Edison had cut his with a 1/450-inch groove!
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Edison’s long-playing 80-rpm discs, introduced in 1926, boasted total playing times of 24 minutes (10″) and 40 minutes (12″) but were cobbled together by dubbing from existing Diamond Discs. A commercial failure, they were discontinued within two years.
And they played at the standard 78 speed, isn’t that correct?
Well, if I remember rightly, Edison used 80 r.p.m. as the standard speed for those old Diamond Discs. And he didn’t vary the speed like Victor used to do in the acoustical days. There’s a lady [Aida Favia-Artsay] who has done a study of all of the Caruso records that he made at Victor. The recording speeds that they were using could vary as much as five r.p.m. from one session to the next.
Yes, I know her, and know her book. She even included a stroboscope disc with the book so that listeners could check the turntable speeds for themselves, and hear Caruso at score pitch.
Back to Edison, do you know that the stylus he developed for those records, his diamond stylus, was elliptical, not round?
Did he file a patent on that?
No, but it’s there in his notebooks at West Orange. And each side of those Edisons, by the way, played for twenty-five minutes. At 80 r.p.m.! Can you imagine that? How the “Old Man,” as his staff always called him, could make recording lathes that would consistently cut 1/450-inch grooves is still amazing to me. That’s one of the truly great engineering feats in the history of this industry. But, of course, Edison had invented the phonograph, so I guess anything he did was bound to be the best.
Did you ever know anyone who worked directly with Edison in the 1920s?
No. But I certainly read all of the patents he filed about recording technology. Do you know that he didn’t file a patent for one of the most important cutting styluses that he designed?
I don’t think I’m familiar with that. What was its design?
It was a heated cutting stylus. It had a heating coil on it.
But don’t you hold the patent for the heated-coil stylus?
Yes, I do. And I wouldn’t have that patent if Edison had ever filed one. He had been using a heated cutting stylus before World War One. I guess he thought it was so obvious that a heated stylus would cut a much better groove in a warm wax [recording] blank that he didn’t give any thought to patenting it. But the heating-coil stylus is right there in his lab books at West Orange.
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Whether Thomas Edison would have been “excited” over the Columbia LP is questionable, given the commercial failure of his company’s long-playing system two decades earlier. (August 1948)
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Do you have any idea why Edison resisted electrical recording?
I don’t know for sure. That was a little before my time. But Gus [Haenschen] might know because he was already a big guy when electrical recording came in. You know, do you, that Gus is an engineer?
Yes. He’s such an icon here that we know his résumé by heart. So I know that he graduated in engineering from Washington University, Class of 1912.
In mechanical engineering. Which, you know, is one of the reasons why he was so successful at Brunswick. He could “talk the talk” as a musician with the singers and the bands that he put under contract, and he could talk engineering with his recording engineers and technicians. He had the respect of both sides. And he was there when Brunswick switched to electrical recording. In fact, he probably oversaw the switch.
Yes, he said that he did oversee it with Percy Deutsch and Walter Rogers.
When are you going to see him next? You have to ask him about the Light-Ray [electrical system]. He’ll get a kick out of that! And tell him I was the one who told you to ask him about it.
The Pallatrope?
Yes, or maybe it was the Panatrope. The one was the recording process, and the other was the phonograph, I think. Or maybe it was the radio part. Anyway, Gus will get a kick out of it because that [process] was a debacle. The recordings were pretty bad, full of distortion.
Was the Brunswick Light-Ray process as innovative as the Western Electric one?
I wouldn’t say “innovative,” no. It was just a selenium-cell process. Edison and also Bell, I think, were experimenting with selenium cells in the recording process way back in the 1880s or 1890s. So there was nothing new about that when Brunswick started pushing it in the 1920s. Ask Gus was the poor guy who was partly in charge of it, but I don’t think Brunswick stayed with that Light-Ray system. Even though [Brunswick’s publicity department] kept advertising it all over the place, I’m pretty sure they junked it and made a deal with Western Electric for the Westrex system.
And I will also ask him about Edison’s reluctance to go electrical when Victor, Columbia, and Brunswick made the switch. Did you know Maxfield and Harrison, the developers of the Western Electric process?
Not personally, no. Again, that was a little before my time. But the Westrex system that they developed at Bell Labs and Western Electric was a major step forward. They took the frequency range from about 2,500 Hz in the acoustical days, to about 15,000 Hz. Now, 2,500 Hz would have been on a very good day in the acoustical era. And what a difference [their] new condenser microphones made. Carbon mikes went by the wayside fairly quickly after that.
Were you involved in the development of Full Frequency Range Recording, or ff/rr as it was called then?
No—that was [British] Decca’s. The full frequency-range system extended the lows to about 80 Hz. The highs were still around 15,000 Hz, but the signal-to-noise ratio was really low. That’s was what set the ff/rr apart. You can hear a big difference between an ff/rr and a standard recording. That depends somewhat, of course, on what the content is.
On the Columbia “20/20” private album celebrating the twentieth anniversary of the introduction of the LP, you say that some of the content of the first LPs was done by splicing tapes of 78s. Is that correct?
Yes, in some cases. We began making high-quality vinyl pressings of 78s in our “Masterworks” series so that we could splice them seamlessly for the LP if we had to.
Did you tape-record the 78 vinyl pressings and then edit the tape to make the transitions seamless from one pressing to the next?
No, because that would have added a variable that we didn’t want. If we had gone to tape and then edited the gap between one 78 and the next one, doing that would have introduced tape “hiss,” which we would have to correct with filters. So what we did was to use two studio-grade 78 turntables and we would stop the one [turntable] and start the other. Our tech staff got so good at timing the starting and stopping of the turntables that there is no audible change in the content of the final LP recording.
One last question about the LP and the 45 disc and the so-called “War of the Speeds”: At that time did you think the 78 record would continue to be a commercial product just as it had since the turn of the [twentieth] century?
Yes and no. A lot of us thought that the 78 would still be viable if it was pressed in vinyl. I know for a fact that RCA thought that the 78 would disappear and that their 45 would replace it—and RCA had no doubt that the LP was going to flourish because of the obvious advantages it had over any other format. In hindsight, we [i.e., Columbia] were rather dismissive of the RCA 45 because there was nothing really new about it, other than the speed—and we didn’t think much of the speed either. We used to joke that RCA came up with 45 r.p.m. by subtracting 33 from 78!
Related Article:
Battle of the Speeds: LPs, 45s, and the Decline
of the 78 (1939 – 1950)
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© 2024 by James A. Drake. All rights are reserved.
Harry Pace, W. E. B. Du Bois, John Fletcher, and the
Saga of the Second Black-Owned Record Label
By Allan Sutton
This new account draws on Pace Phonograph Corporation documents and correspondence between Harry Pace and W. E. B. Du Bois (Du Bois Papers, Special Collections and University Archives, University of Massachusetts Amherst Libraries), as well as information newly uncovered while researching John Fletcher’s involvement with Black Swan and the affiliated Fletcher Record Company.
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Founded in December 1920 by Harry H. Pace, the Pace Phonograph Corporation was the second Black-owned and operated record company (preceded only by George W. Broome’s short-lived eponymous venture), and the first to succeed commercially, albeit briefly.
A 1903 graduate of Atlanta University, Pace initially worked in banking, but his interests turned increasingly to music. He and W. C. Handy collaborated on their first song in 1907, and in 1912 the pair formed the Pace & Handy Music Company in Memphis. The company had its first major hit in 1914, with the publication of Handy’s “St. Louis Blues,” and in 1918 it relocated to New York. Pace resigned in late 1920 to launch his recording operation, taking some key personnel with him. Handy recalled, “With Pace went a large number of our employees, persons especially trained for the requirements of our business and therefore hard to replace. Still more confusion and anguish grew out of the fact people did not generally know that I had no stake in the Black Swan record company.”
On December 27, 1920, Pace wrote to W. E. B. Du Bois that he had formed a corporation to manufacture phonograph records. He held open the possibility of involving others, telling Du Bois, “I made the capital stock elastic enough so as to take others into it if the idea met very favorable consideration.”
The letter also makes clear that it was Du Bois who suggested the name “Black Swan” (in honor of the pioneering African-American diva, Elizabeth Taylor Greenfield). Pace wrote,
I note your suggestion about the name “Black Swan” and it strikes me very favorably indeed. I debated very seriously whether I should use a fanciful name or whether I should capitalize on my own name and use it… All of this, of course, had been done before I talked with you on the subject.
Pace reported to Du Bois that he had Ford Dabney’s Orchestra under contract and had already made test recordings by the group. However, no issues were forthcoming, and Dabney later signed with Paramount. Pace also told Du Bois that he was hoping to test operatic soprano Florence Cole-Talbert (who he signed), a very young Marian Anderson (who he did not), and one or two “local folks who are getting in shape, and whom I am trying out with a view of having them record as soon as we are ready to make the permanent masters.”
W. E. B. Du Bois (left) and Harry Pace
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Pace encouraged Du Bois to join the new company’s board and provide whatever funding he could. The Pace Phonograph Corporation was formally chartered as a Delaware corporation in January 1921 and made an initial stock offering. Du Bois initially purchased a single share, but would later invest considerably more, and come to regret it. The officers at the time of incorporation were Pace (president and treasurer) and D. L. Haynes (secretary), with a board of directors that included Du Bois, Levi C. Brown, T. K. Gibson, William Lewis, John E. Nail, and Emmett J. Scott. Pace and Du Bois reported finding eager investors not only in Harlem, but in Arkansas, Georgia, Ohio, and other far-flung locations.
Among Pace’s investors was comedian Bert Williams, who according to a misleadingly worded advertisement in The Crisis, “put thousands of dollars into the making of Black Swan records.” It would not be only time that Pace took some liberties in describing Williams’ relationship to Black Swan. Following Williams’ death, Pace placed a full-page advertisement in The Crisis, in which he claimed that Williams had promised to sign with Black Swan once his Columbia contract expired. Canny businessman that he was, it seems unlikely that Williams would have abandoned a company whose annual sales of his records exceeded Black Swan’s total annual sales.
Pace’s memorial to Bert Williams in the April 1922 Crisis included the questionable claim that Williams had promised to become an exclusive Black Swan artist following expiration of his contract with “a White company.”
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Harry Pace’s townhouse at 257 West 138th Street served as Black Swan’s first office. Among the employees Pace took from Pace & Handy Music was Fletcher Hamilton Henderson, Jr., a young pianist from Georgia whom Handy had recently hired as a song demonstrator. Henderson’s defection garnered him the position of recording director and house accompanist, although Pace later admitted he felt that Henderson was not fully qualified for the job. William Grant Still, one of W. C. Handy’s staff arrangers, also made the move.
The studio in which Pace initially recorded remains a subject of debate. The location is not mentioned in any of Pace’s or Du Bois’ known correspondence, but the old tale that Pace initially recorded in his living-room is highly suspect. There is no suggestion in those letters that Pace ever equipped his own studio or hired a recording engineer. A New York Age article from June 1921 confirms that Pace did not yet have his own studio, reporting that the company was “planning to establish its own laboratory [i.e., studio] in the near future.” No convincing evidence has been found that those plans ever came to fruition.
If any of Pace’s pre-production test recordings have survived, they have not been located for inspection. Most of the early issued masters appear to have been made for Pace by the New York Recording Laboratories, the makers of Paramount records, based upon some distinctive physical and aural characteristics. NYRL at that time was recording masters for several other small labels — most notably Arto and Grey Gull, as confirmed in band manager Ed Kirkeby’s session logs — which were assigned master numbers in each label’s own series.
Black Swan records were in production by the early spring of 1921, with an initial release planned for May. Pressing was to be handled by John Fletcher’s Olympic Disc Record Corporation plant in Long Island City. Newly incorporated following the failure of Fletcher’s Operaphone label, Olympic commenced operations in March 1921, the same month in which the earliest issued Black Swan recordings are believed to have been made. Like Black Swan, the earliest Olympic records were advertised as May releases. The discs’ physical characteristics were identical with those of the earliest Black Swan pressings, confirming Harry Pace’s recollection that they were pressed in what he called “the Remington factory” (the Remington Phonograph Company being Olympic’s parent corporation).
.(Left) An early first-state Black Swan label, showing the sunken ring around the spindle hole and other tell-tale Olympic pressing-plant characteristics. (Right) A second-state label, pressed by the New York Recording Laboratories.
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From the start, Pace found himself torn between two disparate markets within the African-American community — a small but affluent group that championed what it saw as cultural refinement, mirroring Pace’s and Du Bois’ own backgrounds and musical preferences; and a far larger working-class group with a growing appetite for jazz and blues records. In August 1921, Pace told The Talking Machine World, “While it is true that we will feature to a great extent ‘blue’ numbers of the type that are in current favor, we will also release many numbers of a higher standard.” In his attempt to present Black Swan as a respectable mainstream operation to potential investors, Pace understandably erred on the side of caution in his choice of artists and repertoire.
The first three Black Swan records were announced as ready for delivery on May 4, 1921. Pace’s preference for “numbers of a higher standard” was immediately apparent. For the inaugural release (#2001), he chose two time-worn chestnuts, “At Dawning” and “Thank God for a Garden,” sung by soprano Revella Hughes, with violin, cello, and piano accompaniment. There followed two equally straightforward sides by concert baritone Carroll C. Clark, then two blues-inflected pop tunes by vaudevillian Katie Crippen.
Pace promised “a delightful surprise” to anyone comparing Caroll Clark’s recording of “For All Eternity” to Caruso’s version (Victor 88333; the ad copy omitted the first digit).
Pace reported first-month sales of 10,300 Black Swan records to Du Bois, who forwarded that figure to The Crisis. The editors, apparently unaware that figure was a minuscule fraction of the major labels’ sales for the same period, seemed impressed.
The Black press (particularly The Chicago Defender) cast Pace’s attempt to enter the record market as nothing less than an epic struggle between good and evil. The venture had barely gotten under way when the Defender proclaimed that “a great uproar was caused among White phonograph record companies who resented the idea of having a Race company enter what they felt was an exclusive field.” If there was an uproar, it went unreported in trade papers like The Talking Machine World, which covered Black Swan to the same extent as the other small startups of the period. TMW’s coverage of the new company was consistently positive, and the magazine obviously was not averse to running Black Swan advertisements.
One of the Defender‘s most absurd claims, flying in the face of well-documented facts, was that the Remington Phonograph Company had purchased the Olympic pressing plant for the sole purpose of denying service to Pace — conveniently ignoring the fact that Olympic had pressed the earliest Black Swan discs.
What actually caused Pace and Olympic to part company was a surge in orders that the Olympic plant was not equipped to handle. During the summer of 1921, it was decided to instead contract Black Swan pressing to the New York Recording Laboratories (Paramount). In a postcard to Du Bois, mailed on June 24, 1921, from Port Washington, Wisconsin (NYRL’s headquarters), Pace reported, “I am here arranging for an increased fall and winter production together with a line of Black Swan Phonographs.”
The NYRL pressing plant, although geographically remote, was a much larger facility than Olympic’s, and the company was actively courting new customers. In addition, Wisconsin Chair (NYRL’s parent company) operated a large factory that was well-equipped to manufacture Pace’s Swanola phonographs. Since Pace was already using NYRL’s New York recording studio, the move made logistical sense, consolidating all Black Swan production within a single company. Black Swan pressings from the summer of 1921 into the spring of 1922 show the unmistakable characteristics of NYRL’s work.
The initial Black Swan releases were received politely enough by the press and public. Carroll Clark’s first offering appears to have been a relatively good seller, based upon the relatively large number of surviving copies. But the earliest issues failed to generate the sort of excitement that would be needed to make Black Swan profitable. That situation changed with Pace’s signing of Ethel Waters. Already a veteran of the southern vaudeville circuits, Waters was now attracting a strong following at Edmond’s Cellar in Harlem.
Waters had already recorded two titles for Criterion Laboratories, an independent studio that supplied several small labels, but there had been no immediate takers (Cardinal eventually released them in September 1921), so Waters paid a visit to Pace. Her first Black Swan release (“Down Home Blues” / “Oh Daddy”) was released in July 1921. It became a sizable hit, and is still one of the most commonly encountered Black Swan records. In October, Pace signed Waters to an exclusive Black Swan contract that reportedly made her the highest-paid Black recording artist at the time. In November, she was sent on an extended tour as star of the Black Swan Troubadours, who eventually performed in twenty-one states.
.Black Swan’s first hit: “Down Home Blues” (here advertised in August 1921) brought national attention to Ethel Water and Black Swan. Pace plugged many of Waters’ subsequent releases as “Another ‘Down Home Blues'” (the example above is from late 1922), but none approached the popularity of the original.
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Thanks largely to Waters’ records, Black Swan developed a small following among White customers, including some stage and film celebrities. It was widely reported that actress Marilyn Miller had presented a “large selection” of Black Swan records to Jack Pickford (Mary’s brother) on their wedding day. The Dallas Express reported, “It is now becoming quite a fad with many stars of the theatrical profession, who have found something different in these all-Colored records, to have them sent to their friends in various parts of the country.”
Pace, however, failed to capitalize on that momentum. He placed no advertising in the White consumer publications and made little effort to court the important entertainment and trade papers. His advertisements in The Talking Machine World, which did not begin running until August 1921, often appeared to be halfhearted efforts, sometimes simply listing a few artists’ names, or dwelling on past hits rather than fresh releases.
Trixie Smith, Pace’s next major attraction, was signed in January 1922, shortly after she took first place at the Fifteenth Regiment Blues Contest in Harlem. With Waters and Smith on his roster, Pace found it easier to attract other singers. However, the oft-repeated tale that he auditioned Bessie Smith, and rejected her after she stopped to spit in the midst of her test recording, is apocryphal. It appears to have originated in the 1940s with W. C. Handy, who was prone to fabricating colorful tales. He is unlikely to have been present at the alleged session (or any other Black Swan session for that matter), given the well-documented antagonism that existed between himself and Pace at the time. (The Black Swan issues by Handy’s Band were not recorded for Pace, but licensed from Paramount.)
April 1922 saw Harry Pace’s quixotic attempt to cast Black Swan as a contender in the classical field with the introduction of a Red Label series, an obvious play on Victor’s prestigious Red Seals. Victor, which for years had taken legal action against competitors’ use of red labels on classical records, does not appear to have taken any such action in Black Swan’s case, casting further doubt on the Defender‘s claims that the White recording establishment was out to destroy Pace.
The Red Label listing included operatic arias by Florence Cole-Talbert and Antoinette Garnes, and concert selections by Hattie King Reavis. In December 1922, Pace tried to secure concert tenor Roland Hayes for Black Swan, only to be informed by Hayes that he was under contract to Aeolian in England. The Red Label series sputtered along until being discontinued in May 1923, marking the end of Pace’s production of original classical recordings.
Although demand for Black Swan records was growing steadily, weak marketing and spotty distribution were hobbling sales. Pace was unable to obtain national coverage through the major jobbers. Although racial prejudice was likely a factor in some cases, small White-owned startups had experienced the same problem for many years. In Pace’s case, however, the major distributors’ lack of confidence probably was compounded by his lack of any track-record in the recording business and Black Swan’s nearly exclusive targeting of a still-unproven market.
.Lacking national distribution, Harry Pace recruited small-time retailers and enterprising individuals “with a backbone” to sell Black Swan records wherever and however they could.
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Pace countered by recruiting small-time retailers and enterprising individuals to sell the records wherever and however they could. In June 1921, he hired Paul Robeson (who was then a student at Rutgers) as a part-time salesman. But as he had with Marian Anderson, Pace missed a golden opportunity by failing to record him.
That autumn, Pace hired C. Udell Turpin (spelled Turpine in some accounts, but Turpin in company correspondence) as his sales manager. A Columbia University business school graduate, Turpin brought along several sales professionals he knew from a previous venture, but he continued to build Pace’s network of small retailers and individual salespeople as well, advertising in The Crisis, “We want men and women with a backbone and a desire to earn $100 a week…men and women who don’t care what $20 a week people think.”
.Pace depended heavily on heavily on “agents” — independent sellers like Mrs. L. A. Shaw of Dallas, Texas.
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In March 1922, Pace published a Black Swan distributor map in The Crisis that looked impressive at first glance, with all forty-eight states covered to varying degrees. The heaviest concentrations were east of the Mississippi, but many states had a distributor or jobber, and at least a few retail dealers. However, the largest number of dots on the map represented “agents,” those independent salespeople who peddled the records door-to-door, from their homes, or wherever else they could.
..Black Swan record distribution, as depicted in The Crisis
for March 1922. “Agents” (individual sellers) predominate, while distributors and jobbers are widely scattered.
.
In January 1922, The New York Age perhaps unintentionally revealed the company’s financial fragility when it reported that Black Swan had made a profit of slightly more than $3,300 on sales of $104,628.74 in 1921. Although the reporter seemed impressed by the latter figure, it was minuscule by industry standards of the day. Given that Black Swan records initially retailed for $1 (reduced to 85¢ late in the year), and normal wholesale rates were 50% of list price, Black Swan’s 1921 sales probably amounted to between a quarter- and a half-million records, depending upon the ratio of wholesale to direct retail sales. In the same year, the Victor Talking Machine Company sold nearly fifty-five million records.
On March 25, 1922, assets of John Fletcher’s bankrupt Olympic Disc Record Corporation were auctioned by order of the company’s receiver. The purchaser was Fletcher himself, in partnership with Harry Pace and Michael Naughton. For their winning bid, they acquired ownership of Olympic’s trademarks and masters, but more importantly for Pace, the company’s Long Island City studio and pressing plant — the same “Remington” plant that had pressed for Pace in the spring of 1921.
The Fletcher Record Company was incorporated in New York on May 26, 1922. Fletcher, Pace, and Naughton were listed as directors of the new company, which was chartered simply “to deal in merchandise.” With Fletcher serving as president, and Pace as vice-president and treasurer, the Fletcher Record Company was the first American record company to have a racially integrated executive team. However, there appears to have been only minimal interaction between Pace and Fletcher.
The Fletcher Record Company initially served only as a supplier to Pace, recording Black Swan’s masters and making pressings to order; its name never appeared on a Black Swan label. The Pace Phonograph Corporation continued to function as an autonomous entity, with a separate board of directors, and with Harry Pace still largely in control of who and what appeared on the Black Swan label. It would not be long however, before disguised Olympic recordings began turning up in the Black Swan catalog.
Initially, at least, the arrangement eliminated the production bottlenecks that has plagued Black Swan from the start. Pace was soon able to report, “We are now issuing ten numbers a month instead of three…. We do our own recording, plating, pressing, as well as printing of every description, in the above plant.” However, the operation soon proved to be unprofitable.
.Fletcher-era Black Swan pressings. Note the return of the sunken ring surrounding the spindle hole, which is absent on the New York Record Laboratories’ and Bridgeport Die & Machine Company’s Black Swan pressings. Black Swan 60006 is a reissue from Fletcher’s Olympic catalog, with xylophonist George Hamilton Green disguised as “Raymond Green.”
Fletcher revived his Olympic label later that year, with an all-White artist roster. Pace had already reissued some older Olympic recordings on Black Swan, under pseudonyms, quietly breaking his pledge to use only Black artists.
By July 1922, so many outside recordings by White artists were being released on Black Swan that the catalog was split into ten separately numbered series. Of those, only the 14000 race series (replacing the original 2000’s) and 7100 operatic series remained purely Pace productions, employing Black artists exclusively. The remainder — which included Hawaiian, novelty, sacred, and classical and operatic series — were made up almost entirely of pseudonymous reissues from Fletcher’s Olympic catalog. There was also a smattering of sides from Paramount and Pathé, the latter consisting of material Pathé had earlier licensed to Fletcher for his Operaphone label.
In an ironic twist, the nation’s first successful race-record label was now producing its own racially segregated catalog, while continuing to push the misleading claim that it was “the only record made by colored people.”
.Pace broke his pledge to use only Black artists (above) even before going into partnership with John Fletcher. By the time this ad appeared in The Crisis in late 1922 (below), the Black Swan catalog contained many pseudonymous reissues from Fletcher’s all-White Olympic catalog.
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The aliases employed by Black Swan for Olympics’ White artists were obviously contrived to suggest Black performers. Various Harry Yerkes groups became “Joe Brown’s Alabama Band” or “Sammy Swift’s Jazz Band,” Rudy Wiedeoft’s Californians became “Haynes’ Harlem Syncopators,” and novelty whistler Margaret McKee was renamed “Bessie Johnson.” Recordings
by Irving Weiss’ Ritz-Carlton Orchestra, Fred Van Eps’ Quartet, and Wiedoeft’s Palace Trio were released as “Ethel Waters’ Jazz Masters” while Waters was on tour and likely unaware that Pace was using her name on records with which she nothing to do. Some Olympic recordings by conventional White dance bands were credited to “Henderson’s Dance Orchestra” or “Henderson’s Novelty Orchestra,” with no first name given, but obviously meant to imply Fletcher Henderson’s involvement, even after Henderson had left the company.
At least one newspaper was taken in by the bogus artist credits. A reporter for The Chicago Defender praised the Baltimore Blues Orchestra as “a new musical organization…doing exclusive recording for Black Swan records,” unaware that name was simply a disguise for several White dance bands from the Olympic roster. Whether record buyers were more savvy than the Defender‘s reporter is unknown, but Black Swan sales began to stall.
In September 1922, a bomb was discovered in a load of coal delivered to the Fletcher pressing plant, and the old paranoia resurfaced. “The officials of the company were alarmed at first,” The Chicago Defender reported, “lest it were the work of white competitors.” Pace’s reaction exposed his continued inability to understand and respect his competitors, none of whom had ever been even vaguely suspected of employing such tactics. Fortunately, calmer heads prevailed, and the unnamed Defender reporter later admitted that investigators believed the event might have been connected with an ongoing coal workers’ strike.
Pace reported sales of only 256,202 Black Swan records for fiscal year 1922. In his November 1922 financial statement, he acknowledges that Black Swan had experienced “the greatest slump since we began business” during July.
The slump persisted into early October, by which time Pace seemed resigned to average monthly sales of only 25,000 records. “I am trying to devise some sales plan whereby this figure can be greatly increased,” he wrote to Du Bois, “but regret to say that I have not yet hit upon it.” In the same month, Pace set up a dummy collection agency to handle delinquent accounts. Although the operation netted only $544 in its first month, Pace seemed pleased with that figure and reported that the operation was “still pulling them in.”
Pace advertised a new stock issue in October 1922, promising a “certain” 6% return in three years, plus 6% dividends.” But no dividends were forthcoming, and the stock would soon be virtually worthless.
By late 1922, it must have been clear to Harry Pace that he needed to disentangle himself from the Fletcher plant. Pace Phonograph’s financial report of November 8, 1922, noted, “The factory has been a severe drain on our cash.” On January 20, 1923, he reorganized the Pace Phonograph Corporation as the Black Swan Record Company, ending what had become an unprofitable relationship with John Fletcher. Fletcher carried on alone, but his revived Olympic label failed to attract much attention.
With the Fletcher connection severed, Pace returned to the New York Recording Laboratories for pressings, using the affiliated Bridgeport Die & Machine Company in Connecticut as a secondary supplier. A new three-color label design and the release of a new catalog in May 1923 apparently did little to boost sales.
.Letterheads for the original Pace Phonograph Corporation (above) and the Black Swan Phonograph Company (below), a 1923 reorganization of the original corporation following Pace’s split with John Fletcher. (W. E. B. Du Bois Papers, University of Massachusetts Amherst Libraries)
The problems at Black Swan had not escaped the notice of Pace’s artists. Alberta Hunter was the first major artist to leave the label. Reportedly unhappy with Black Swan’s lackluster marketing efforts, she moved to Paramount in July 1922. Fletcher Henderson departed that autumn. His position was filled by William Grant Still, who took over as Black Swan’s new recording director on November 13. Pace, who later stated that he had not been satisfied with Henderson’s work, predicted that “Still will bring wider experience and more technical musical knowledge than Henderson has had, and I believe will greatly improve the work of the records.” But being preoccupied with his theatrical work and growing stature as a serious composer, Still brought about no apparent improvement in Black Swan’s recorded output.
The company’s reorganization and declining fortunes spurred a second and far more damaging artist exodus. It began in March 1923 with the departure of Trixie Smith, one of Black Swan’s most popular singers. Smith was followed in short order by Josie Miles, Julia Moody, Lena Wilson, among others. Smith landed an exclusive Paramount contract, while many of the lesser-lights signed on as free-lance recording artists with music publisher and booking agent Joe Davis, who shopped them around to whatever labels would have them.
In the meantime, Ethel Waters had begun touring quite successfully on her own, in what could only be seen as an ominous sign for Pace. When the Black Swan Troubadours embarked on their 1923 tour, Josie Miles took her place. Waters quit the label in June, after returning from a transcontinental tour to discover that Black Swan was barely operational.
Ethel Waters returned from her 1923 tour to find Black Swan barely operational. She left the label a short time later.
.
The Black Swan office hosted a second-anniversary celebration during the first week of June 1923, albeit with little to celebrate. In or around early August, Fae Barnes made what are believed to have been the last Black Swan recordings.
Only a handful of new Black Swan issues would be forthcoming after July, and some that were advertised are not known to have been released. The label’s last original offering (Ethel Waters’ “Sweet Man Blues” / “Ethel Sings ‘Em,” recorded in June at her final Black Swan session) was advertised in The Chicago Defender on December 22, 1923. Black Swan advertised in the Defender for the last time on February 23, 1924. Even then, Pace was still soliciting “agents in every community.”
By the autumn of 1923, Du Bois was looking to cash out of the failing operation. On October 1, he wrote to Pace,
Is there any market for Black Swan stock? I have got to be out of the country attending the Pan-African Conference for three months and I want to finance my house payments while I am gone. If you think of any way I can help myself by the sale or a hypothecation of any part of my stock, kindly let me know.
Pace could offer no assistance, explaining that “summer has been very dull for us.” By then the company had gone dormant for all practical purposes, and its stock was virtually worthless. Its debts, which reportedly included a substantial sum due the New York Recording Laboratories for pressing services, were accumulating at an alarming rate. At year’s end, Black Swan’s board of directors approved a resolution that read, in part,
To make the corporation successful..will require not simply time, but the uninterrupted and undivided services of all the executive officers. We believe that any division of time or of interest will be fatal to the interest of this corporation. If, however, the president and other officials feel that the present condition of the corporation does not warrant them in giving their full services, we think that every effort should be made to dispose of the assets of the organization… .
In January 1924, Paramount’s Maurice Supper traveled to New York from the company’s Wisconsin headquarters to negotiate a buyout of Black Swan. On April 2, The Port Washington Herald reported that Pace had agreed to sell. With Pace’s abandonment of Black Swan, the race-record business was now entirely in the hands of White-owned record companies.
The New York Recording Laboratories announced its takeover of the Black Swan label in the 1924 Paramount catalog.
Under terms of the agreement with Paramount, the Black Swan Record Company was to remain in existence, but only on paper. It would serve solely as a holding company for the protection of its shareholders and have no further involvement in recording or record production. NYRL would take over the Black Swan trade name, trademark, and goodwill, and it would continue to manufacture and distribute the existing Black Swan recordings. The Black Swan masters would be leased to NYRL, rather than being sold outright, in return for which Pace would be paid a monthly royalty on sales.
(Left) A redesigned Black Swan label appeared in early 1923, following Pace’s split with John Fletcher. Pressings bearing this label were produced by both the New York Recording Laboratories and the affiliated Bridgeport Die & Machine Company (the example pictured was pressed by the latter). The hybrid Paramount – Black Swan reissue label was introduced in June 1924 by NYRL, which leased Pace’s masters.
.
Consumers saw the first evidence of the new arrangement in May 1924, when Paramount’s advertising logo was changed to read “Paramount Records (Combined with Black Swan).” A hybrid Paramount – Black Swan label, combining elements of both companies’ trademarks, was introduced with some fanfare a month later, but it never developed into anything more than a reissue vehicle for previously released Black Swan recordings. Having failed to attract much interest after ninety-nine releases, the joint venture was abandoned. The licensing agreement was finally terminated in January 1926, by which time the Paramount – Black Swan label had already been discontinued.
Pace spent the next several years attempting to liquidate Black Swan’s remaining debt of $18,006, at one point asking stockholders to contribute $10 for each share they owned. He complained, “I did not get even the courtesy of a reply from one percent of the stockholders, and not a dollar were they willing to risk to safeguard $100 invested.”
Pace contributed a few thousand dollars of his own money and made vague allusions to engaging in “other activities” with the potential to raise some funds. The company’s only other significant revue was rental income from the heavily mortgaged Seventh Avenue building, which was netting just $2,500 annually. The masters were deemed worthless; a message to stockholders noted “it is doubtful if anything is going to be realized” from their sale. As far as can be determined, no buyer was found, and the masters have long-since vanished.
In a final January 1927 appeal to Du Bois and other investors, Pace characterized his efforts as a “worry for me and punishing effort which appears to be wholly unappreciated by some.” He then turned his back on the recording industry, went on earn a law degree from the University of Chicago, and in later years operated an insurance business.
Selected References
“2nd Anniversary — Black Swan Record Co. Crosses Another Mile Line.” Chicago Defender (Jun 2, 1923), p. 6.
“A Consolidation.” Chicago Defender (Apr 19, 1924), p. 6.
“A New York Incorporation.” Talking Machine World (Feb 15, 1921), p. 157.
Allen, Walter C. “Report on Black Swan.” Unpublished manuscript (Jun 12, 1961). William R. Bryant Papers, Mainspring Press Collection.
“Black Swan Artists Broadcast.” Talking Machine World (May 15, 1922), p. 43.
“Black Swan Takes Over Company.” Chicago Defender (Apr 1922).
“Black Swan Records—New Firm Announces First List of Productions.” Chicago Defender (May 4, 1921), p. 8.
“C. Udell Turpin Takes Charge.” Talking Machine World (Oct 15, 1921), p. 46.
“Demand for Ethel Waters Record.” Talking Machine World (Aug 15, 1921), p. 89.
“Distribution System of Black Swan Phonograph Records.” The Crisis (Mar 1922), p 221.
Du Bois, W. E. B. Letter to Roland Hayes (New York, Nov 24, 1922), re: Invitation to record for Black Swan. W. E. B. Du Bois Papers (Special Collections and University Archives, University of Massachusetts Amherst Libraries).
— . Letter to Harry Pace (New York, Oct 1, 1923), re: sale of stock.
Du Bois, W. E. B., et al. “To the Stockholders of the Black Swan Phonograph Company” (New York, Jan 2, 1926). Du Bois Papers.
“Gives Jack Pickford Black Swan Records as Wedding Present.” Dallas Express (Nov 11, 1922), p. 1.
Handy, W. C. (Arna Bomtemps, editor). Father of the Blues—An Autobiography, pp. 202–203. New York: Macmillan (1941).
“New Incorporations.” New York Times (May 26, 1922), p. 34.
“New Incorporations — Capital Increases.” New York Times (Feb 1, 1923), p. 28
“New Incorporations — Delaware Charters.” New York Times (Feb 5, 1921), p. 22
“New York Charters—Name Changes.” New York Times (Jan 30, 1923), p. 27
“New Incorporations—New York Charters.” New York Times (Jun 25, 1921), p. 13.
“Now the Fletcher Record Company — Plant of Olympic Disc Record Corp. Purchased by Harry Pace and John Fletcher and Will Be Operated by a New Corporation.” Talking Machine World (Jul 15, 1922), p. 57.
Pace, Harry H. Letter to W. E. B. Du Bois (New York, Dec 27, 1920), re: Company launch and Du Bois’ proposal of the Black Swan name. Du Bois Papers.
— . Letter to W. E. B. Du Bois (New York, Mar 21, 1922), re: Financial statement through Dec 31, 1921.
— . Letter to W. E. B. Du Bois (New York, Dec 23, 1922), re: Roland Hayes, and proposal to press imported Caruso masters. Du Bois Papers.
— . Letter to Du Bois, et al. (New York, Jan 19, 1927), re: Ongoing attempts to liquidate Black Swan debt.
— . Postcard to W. E. B. Du Bois (Port Washington, WI, Jun 24, 1921), re: Preparations for increased record production. Du Bois Papers.
— . Stockholder Notice (New York, Jan 1, 1923), re: Organization of Black Swan Phonograph Company. Du Bois Papers.
Pace Phonograph Corp. “Black Swan Records.” U.S. trademark filing #149,558 (Jun 23, 1921).
“Pace Phonograph Corp. Changes Name.” Talking Machine World (Feb 15, 1923), p. 124.
“Phonograph Company Making Rapid Progress.” New York Age (Jun 18, 1921), p. 6.
“Purchase Black Swan Business.” Talking Machine World (Apr 15, 1924), p. 168.
“Report of Pace Phonograph Corporation” (Nov 8, 1922). Du Bois Papers.
“Robeson Casts His Chances with Pace Phonograph Co.” Chicago Defender (Jun 18, 1921), p. 9.
“Sales by Class of Record and Total Sales of Records by Units,
Years 1901 and 1941 Inclusive” (Exhibit: Victor record sales). U.S. District Court, S.D. of N.Y., Jan. 26 1943
“The Horizon” (re: First-month Black Swan record sales). The Crisis (Aug 1921), p. 176.
“The Horizon” (re: Black Swan distribution and record sales). The Crisis (Mar 1922), p. 220.
“The Swanola—A New Phonograph” (ad). The Crisis (Oct 1921), p. 284.
Thygesen, Helge, et al. Black Swan: The Record Label of the Harlem Renaissance. Nottingham, UK: VJM Publications (1996).
“To the Investing Public.” The Crisis (Nov 1922), p. 282.
“Try to Make It Hot for Black Swan.” Chicago Defender (Sep 16, 1922), p. 3.
“White Phonograph Record Companies Object to Colored Men Making Phonograph Records.” Dallas Express (Feb 26, 1921), p. 3.
_________________
© 2024 by Allan R. Sutton. All rights are reserved.
A preliminary version of this work appeared in the author’s Race Records and the American Recording Industry (Mainspring Press, 2017).
The Association for Recorded Sound Collections is pleased to announce the recipients of the ARSC Award for Independent Initiatives:
Colin Hancock — for his use of historical recordings and recording technologies to better interpret the development of jazz.
Ed Lacinski — for his mentoring of students in the art and science of audio production while preserving more than 2,000 of their performances over a 50-year period.
Allan Sutton — for his extensive documentation of American record companies and his meticulous discographies of their recordings.
To read the full press release, visit:
https://arsc-award.org/press.html
The ARSC Award for Independent Initiatives is presented to individuals who advance the field of recorded sound on their own time and their own dime. The award supports the work of individuals, advances the field by publicizing their work, and seeks to inspire others to independently undertake their own initiatives in recorded sound.
The Association for Recorded Sound Collections is a nonprofit organization dedicated to the preservation and study of sound recordings in all genres, in all formats, and from all periods. ARSC facilitates the work of anyone with a serious interest in recorded sound, be they professionals working at institutions or individuals working independently.
This collection contains six Western Electric test recordings from the fall of 1924 that document the emergence of the new recording technology from the laboratory to the commercial recording studio. The engineer’s notations in the dead wax show the system being tested through experimentation and improved through experience. The documentation evolved from the broadest descriptions in October (e.g. “WE Amp & Mic”) to a terse shorthand in December specifying the equipment and settings used in making the recording (e.g. “.2 – 8 – 51“).
Although the discs were pressed by the Victor Talking Machine Company, presumably with the knowledge of Victor’s management, they may or may not have been made in consultation with Victor. At this time Western Electric needed recordings to demonstrate the benefits of its electrical system over the existing acoustical (then termed “direct”) process. All three of harpist Francis Lapitino’s selections were available on commercial issues by Victor and could provide ready comparisons.
Victor installed Western Electric equipment in its Camden recording laboratory in early February 1925 and made its first electrical test recording on February 9. An electrical recording of “Malagueña” made by the Victor Concert Orchestra on February 23 aurally demonstrates how far the technology, and engineers’ mastery over the technology, had progressed in just a few months.
The earliest Western Electric recordings released by Victor were two experimental recordings made three days later, on February 26, by the company’s Eight Popular Victor Artists. The Western Electric system had proven itself, and Victor contracted for its commercial use on March 18, 1925.
Note that the February 23 recording also bears extensive technical markings, although they are of a different character as they were inscribed by Victor’s engineers and not Western Electric’s.
The engineers’ inscriptions on each disc follow, as do Harry O. Sooy’s recollections of the transition from direct recording to electrical recording.
October 7, 1924
October 8, 1924
October 8, 1924
December 17, 1924
December 17, 1924
December 19, 1924
© 2024 by David Giovannoni. All rights are reserved.
Harry O. Sooy on Victor’s Electrical Conversion
As Victor’s chief recording engineer, Harry Sooy oversaw the company’s conversion to electrical recording. Below are his recollections of that transitional period, from the Harry and Raymond Sooy Memoirs at the Hagley Library (Wilmington, Delaware):
David Giovannoni has made his collection of Indestructible cylinders (comprising virtually all of the two-minute releases and a substantial number of four-minutes, including multiple takes) available for free streaming on the i78s.org site. There are two streaming files for each record — a “flat” transfer for fans of surface noise, and a professional restoration for the rest of us.
i78s currently has more than 48,300 cylinders and early 78s available to stream free of charge (including many exceedingly rare items), all accompanied by high-quality rim or label scans, discographical details, histories of the producing companies from Mainspring’s American Record Producers and Companies, 1888–1950, and in many cases, scans of the matching sheet music. Registration is free and secure, requiring no personal information.
David and I are currently overhauling Mainspring Press’ earlier Indestructible book, inspecting and listening to every available cylinder to ensure the highest degree of accuracy. The revised edition will be released as a free PDF e-book, on the University of California–Santa Barbara’s DAHR site, later this year.
— Allan Sutton
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For professional musicians in the 1940s, membership in the American Federation of Musicians was essential. Among the few to resist were members of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, whose management was firmly opposed to unionization. Under pressure from RCA’s David Sarnoff, BSO officials finally capitulated, and the newly unionized orchestra was allowed to return to the RCA studios. No sooner had it done so than the BSO found itself shut out again, this time by an industry-wide recording ban ordered by AFM president James Caesar Petrillo. [1]
Petrillo had long held a vendetta against what he termed “canned music,” blaming it for the downturn in live performances. Widely reviled by recording-industry officials as a coarse, obscenity-spewing petty dictator, Petrillo did not hesitate to employ strong-arm tactics against anyone who opposed him.
In early 1941, Petrillo recruited bandleader-turned-recording director Ben Selvin to undertake a survey intended to prove that recorded music was responsible for the declining employment of union musicians. [2] Selvin’s questionnaires, individually tailored for commercial record companies, transcription producers, radio stations, advertising agencies, and jukebox operators, were mailed in the spring of 1941. Based upon the initial responses, involving the radio-transcription business, Selvin concluded, “The amount of money spent for musical talent on recorded [as opposed to live] programs is much higher than anyone in the industry would have guessed.” [3]
Armed with Selvin’s flimsy anecdotal findings, Petrillo presented his case at the AFM’s convention on June 9, 1941. He contended that although AFM members earned approximately $3 million annually in royalties from recordings, they lost $100 million as the result of what he termed “reduced employment opportunities” from the substitution of recorded for live music. Petrillo estimated that eight- to nine-thousand AFM musicians could be put to work if records were not available and establishments were forced to rely on live music, while admitting that he had no firm statistics to back up his claims.
The issue came to a head in June 1942, when Petrillo ordered members of the Ringling Brothers–Barnum and Bailey Circus Band to strike. Director Merle Evans’ assurances that he and his musicians were “perfectly satisfied” with salaries and working conditions were ignored, and John Ringling North’s request to personally negotiate with Petrillo went unanswered. [4] Petrillo’s demands included higher wages, with time-and-a-half for Sunday performances, which were rejected. After a brief postponement to allow the band to play a benefit for handicapped children, the strike order was enforced. Circus officials responded by substituting recorded music over a public-address system during the band’s forced absence. [5] It apparently was lost on Petrillo that his strike order had caused live musicians to be replaced by recordings — the very situation he had recently railed against at the AFM conference.
Having defeated a circus band, Petrillo next targeted American youth. In July he banned the broadcasting of a popular high-school band festival in Interlochen, Michigan. The action brought universal condemnation from the public, the broadcast industry, and members of Congress. Petrillo was unrepentant. “When amateur musicians occupy the air,” he proclaimed, “it means less work for professionals.” [6]
The Interlochen incident prompted the Federal Communications Commission to launch an investigation of Petrillo, but it resulted in only a mild rebuke from chairman James Fly, and a vague recommendation that a committee be formed to study the situation. [7] Iowa Senator D. W. Clark filed a formal, if ineffectual, resolution charging Petrillo with depriving the students of their freedom to make their musical talents known, while undermining the national music education program. [8] Stanley E. Hubbard, president of radio station KSPT (St. Paul, Minnesota), issued a scathing denouncement of Petrillo that read in part,
[Petrillo] forbade the broadcast…from the National Music Camp at Interlochen, Mich., in which 160 teen-age boys and girls from 40 states hoped to play for their folks at home. He stopped eight Chinese Boy Scouts from blowing a fanfare in Chicago unless eight union musicians were hired to stand by while the scouts tooted… That is the kind of power Fuehrer Petrillo wields today. [9]
Undeterred, Petrillo next threatened to bar AFM musicians from making radio transcriptions. Key figures in the broadcast industry responded swiftly, with a threat of their own. Five years earlier, broadcasters had informally agreed to retain house orchestras made up of AFM members, whether needed or not, after Petrillo complained that radio’s reliance on recorded music was causing widespread unemployment of union musicians. Now, Broadcasting magazine predicted,
If transcriptions and recordings are banned, as ordered by Mr. Petrillo, it is generally expected that the [broadcast] industry, almost as a unit, will be disposed to release staff orchestras, since the gentlemen’s agreement will have been violated… In a nutshell, the overall view appears to be that AFM has walked out on its 1937 agreement by banning transcription performance, and that the next move is up to Mr. Petrillo. [10]
Petrillo’s next move was to escalate the threat of a recording ban by union musicians, extending it to some commercial recordings . On June 8, 1942, he announced,
We will make records for home consumption, but we won’t make them for jukeboxes. We will make them for the armed forces of the United States and its allies, but not for commercial and sustaining radio programs.” [11]
But Petrillo was not content to stop there. Within several weeks, he decided to extend the ban to all recordings, including those made for home use. On June 27, he served notice to transcription and record companies that all recording by union musicians would cease on August 1. [12] The New York Times reported,
As part of a campaign to force radio stations, soda fountains, bars and restaurants to employ union musicians instead of using recordings, Mr. Petrillo has informed all the record manufacturers that the 140,000 members of his A.F. of L. organization will not make “records, electrical transcriptions or any other form of electrical reproduction of music” after July 31…
Even if Mr. Petrillo’s economics were not fantastic, it is intolerable that a labor leader should dictate to the American people what kind of music it shall or shall not hear. But of we need waste little time in exposing the nonsense in Mr. Petrillo’s economics, we should waste less in denouncing Mr. Petrillo as an individual. It is much more important to remind ourselves that it is our political muddle-headedness and spinelessness that have made the Petrillo type of dictator possible. [13]
In last-minute effort to fend off the threat, U.S. Attorney General Francis Biddle announced on July 23 that he would file for injunction under federal anti-trust laws to prevent implementation of the ban. [14] But on August 1, with Biddle having yet to act, Petrillo’s nationwide recording ban went into effect. .
August 1, 1942: The ban goes into effect.
Petrillo agreed informally to exempt transcriptions for the armed forces and government agencies involved with the war effort, although he soon reneged on even that meager concession. Recordings for motion-picture soundtracks would still be allowed, provided that the recordings did not find their way onto the airwaves or commercially issued records.
Private home recording would also be permitted, but only if the manufacturers of recording blanks would guarantee the recordings would not be broadcast or used in jukeboxes, a provision that obviously was impossible to enforce. There would be no cooperation from the blank manufacturers, who disclaimed any responsibility for the uses to which their products were put. With recording blanks and inexpensive portable recording units readily available, a lively underground market soon developed for custom-duplicated discs from private recording sessions, live performances, and broadcast captures.
There would be no immediate concessions from the record companies, nor full-fledged support from most AFM musicians. Black band-leaders in Philadelphia loudly protested the ban, claiming a potential loss of a half-million dollars in income. [15] In New York, union musicians attended clandestine hotel-room recording sessions for Eli Oberstein’s Hit label, which issued the results under some imaginative aliases. Record-company executives, according to the New York Times, were content “to sit back and try to outwait Mr. Petrillo,” allowing growing public outrage to work in their favor. Directors and officials of the National Association of Broadcasters met informally with record company executives to coordinate their strategies, but apparently neither group felt any compulsion to meet with Petrillo.
The record companies were allowed to continue manufacturing and selling their pre-ban recordings, and with Petrillo’s deadline looming, they scrambled to stockpile enough new masters to sustain them through the work stoppage. “This they did on a 24-hour-per-day schedule,” Billboard reported. “When August 1 arrived, they emerged from their studios with enough masters to last well into 1943.” [16] The same article predicted a return to normal recording operations around January 1943, “assuming that all goes as expected.” It did not.
Petrillo’s actions continued to draw fire from members of Congress. Iowa Senator D. W. Clark, still seething over the Interlochen incident, took to the floor on August 29 to denounce Petrillo as a thug whose actions jeopardized national morale during a time of crisis. [17] At Clark’s urging, a Senate resolution was drafted empowering the Interstate Commerce Commission to investigate whether the recording ban constituted restraint of trade under the Sherman Anti-Trust Act. [18]
The Justice Department’s request for injunction was denied in October by a federal judge in Petrillo’s home district of Chicago. Refusing to hear the defense’s arguments, he dismissed the case on the grounds that anti-trust laws did not apply to labor unions. [19] As the ban dragged on, the case was referred to the Supreme Court, which in February 1943 upheld the lower-court’s decision that the ban was merely a labor dispute, and thus not covered under the Sherman Act. [20]
Petrillo as caricatured in the New York Journal-American
Of the major publications, only Life magazine sided with Petrillo following imposition of the recording ban. A fawning, six-page feature article by Robert Coughlan, published two days after the ban took effect, depicted Petrillo as a gruff but good-hearted defender of the working class who was only looking out for his “boys.” [21] Coughlan was largely alone in his assessment. Three weeks after his story appeared in Life, the American Institute of Public Opinion released the results of a George Gallup poll concerning Petrillo and the AFM strike. Seventy-five percent of respondents said they opposed the ban, and seventy-three percent favored intervention by the federal government. Dr. Gallup reported,
A majority of those who disapprove Petrillo’s actions feel strongly, even vehemently, about the subject. Typical of their views were such statements as, “he’s a petty dictator,” “he’s suffering from a bad case of overgrown ego,” “it’s disgraceful,” and “he ought to go over and join Mussolini.” [22]
The producers of several small labels attempted to negotiate directly with Petrillo, to no avail. Hazzard Reeves of Reeves Sound Studios, and E. V. Brinckerhoff of Brinckerhoff Studios, formed a trade association comprising thirteen New York–area recording studios, which Reeves felt would give them an advantage in negotiating with the AFM. [23] But so far as can be ascertained, they received no acknowledgment from Petrillo.
Neither, initially, did Musicraft president Paul Puner. In February 1943, Pruner attempted to contact Petrillo with a proposal that Musicraft, as a small company, be allowed to pay a lower royalty rate than what Petrillo was demanding. In return, Musicraft would publicly affirm its support of the AFM’s basic principles. [24] After receiving no acknowledgment, Puner followed up on March 11 with a letter requesting a prompt reply. Petrillo’s reply was a curt brush-off. [25] Undeterred, Puner next sent what Billboard termed an “impassioned wire” to Petrillo, desperately offering to negotiate with him under any circumstances, at a date of Petrillo’s choosing. This time Puner received a note stating the matter would be referred to the AFM’s International Executive Board on April 15. [26] Eventually Puner received a personal rejection letter from Petrillo, who dismissed Musicraft’s offer as “peanuts.” [27]
Clearly, Petrillo was not looking to accommodate small producers or negotiate settlements on a company-by-company basis. [28] At the outset, the major labels seemed well-positioned to weather what was expected to be a short-lived action. For a time they made do by drawing down their existing stockpile of masters, combing the vaults for unissued pre-ban recordings, and reissuing some previously deleted material. But they were soon forced to become more creative.
In mid-January 1943, Billboard reported that Decca was about to release the last of its pre-ban recordings, and speculated that Victor and Columbia might soon find themselves in the same situation. [29] With no more new recordings to offer, Decca’s solution was to substitute vocal ensembles (vocalists not being AFM members, and thus not bound to honor the ban) for instrumental backing. The idea was soon copied by Columbia, Victor, and a host of minor labels. “The wholly vocal disks are not being taken seriously as a long-term substitute,” Billboard reported. [30] But they infuriated Petrillo, who resorted to personal intimidation in an attempt to stem the flow. “Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby, and other leading vocalists have been contacted,” he warned a reporter, “and have promised AFM they won’t make records.” [31]
Petrillo stepped up the pressure on recording-studio directors as well. In June 1943, he summoned former ally Ben Selvin, along with RCA’s Leonard Joy, before the board of AFM Local 802 to demand they take no actions “against the best interests of the union.” A Billboard reporter observed,
Although AFM officials made no threats, their “requests” can be quickly enforced, as arrangers and copyists employed for vocal waxings are AFM members. The union has made it plain that it expects cooperation from all its members, and indicated that practically all the record and transcription firms have executives who hold union cards. [32]
One rogue producer refused to be cowed. New instrumental recordings continued to appear on Eli Oberstein’s new Hit label, although they were not credited to any recognizable bands. An anonymous informant, identified in a 1976 interview only as “the music director of a major label,” remembered participating in a clandestine Oberstein session:
One day I found this ad for an arranger… I was told to report to a certain room at the Hotel Claridge at nine that night… and there was Eli Oberstein. In the room with him was a nine-piece orchestra and a disc cutter. Eli had hung blankets over the windows so that the noise from the street wouldn’t be too loud and had stuffed towels under the door so that we wouldn’t bother other guests. Between nine and six the following morning, that band must have cut a dozen hit tunes. I sat right there and did the arrangements, and they sight-read them. Eli paid us all in cash as we left. I don’t know who those guys were, but they were good. [33]
The band sides were attributed to such patently fictitious conductors as Johnny Jones and Peter Piper, leading to a long-standing guessing game among modern discographers as to who was actually responsible. [34] Pee Wee Irwin reportedly admitted in later years that, being short of cash at the time, he had taken the risk and directed the “Willie Kelly” sessions for Oberstein. [35]
Those records soon caught Petrillo’s attention, since there was no evidence that Oberstein had obtained recording licenses for the issued titles. But it was Arthur Fields’ vocal rendition of “Der Fuehrer’s Face” for Hit that touched-off what would become an epic clash between Oberstein and Petrillo. [36] Although Fields as a vocalist was not bound to honor the AFM ban, the record’s sparse instrumental backing placed it within the union’s jurisdiction. Oberstein initially claimed that the recording had been made with a “local pickup crew.” [37] He later changed his story, claiming the masters had come from Mexico, leading some insiders to joke that he must mean Mexico, New Jersey. [38] “Call it bootlegging,” Oberstein told a Down Beat reporter, “but it’s legal.” [39]
Oberstein’s tale failed to convince officials of AFM Local 802, who summoned him before the board to demand he reveal the names of the musicians involved. Oberstein ignored the summons and was given until October 22, 1942, to either testify or be judged “guilty without explanation.” [40] The outcome was eagerly awaited by industry officials, some of whom expressed hope that Oberstein would successfully defy the union. [41] They would be disappointed.
Examination of the union logs failed to reveal any evidence that “Der Fuehrer’s Face” was an AFM-licensed recording. Finally facing the AFM board on October 22, Oberstein elaborated on his latest tale, claiming the masters had been purchased by an unnamed “associate” from an unknown Mexican studio through one Manuel Valdez, who was not available to corroborate the story because he was “on his way back to Mexico.” [42] Oberstein went on to claim that Victor and Decca were also obtaining many of their pop-tune recordings from Mexican studios, which officials of both companies vehemently denied. [43]
On December 24, Oberstein submitted to another grilling by the AFM board, at which he agreed to turn over a list of all masters he supposedly had obtained from Mexican sources. In the meantime, union officials were investigating some suspicious artist credits on Oberstein’s labels that had them “scratching their heads,” according to a Billboard report. No one had heard of Oberstein’s mysterious new band leaders, none of whose names appeared on Local 802’s rolls. The break for Petrillo came after Hit’s “Peter Piper” was spotted in the union rolls as a pseudonym for Jack Small, who was immediately summoned to testify before the AFM’s trial board. [44]
Petrillo finally had his evidence that Eli Oberstein was recording with union musicians in defiance of the AFM ban. Oberstein was expelled from the union and had his recording license revoked in June 1943, on the grounds that his continued release of instrumental recordings was “damaging to the interests of the Federation.” [45] Petrillo was not finished with Oberstein, however. Nineteen music publishers whose songs had been recorded by Hit during the ban were summoned to Petrillo’s office, where the trade press predicted they would be strong-armed into withholding recording rights from any company, such as Oberstein’s Classic Records (the makers of Hit), that was deemed “unfair” by the AFM. [46]
Although Petrillo succeeded in largely crippling the consumer record industry, he was less successful in his attempts to intimidate the transcription companies. Many were involved in work for the war effort and could rely on support from Congress, members of which had already made clear their disdain for Petrillo. Having reneged on his early promise not to interfere with war-related transcription work, Petrillo found himself facing a group of influential executives who charged him with bypassing governmental agencies and undermining the war effort. They asked that the matter be referred to the War Labor Board.
Just hours after the executives released their statement on June 23, 1943, Petrillo agreed to mediation, narrowly avoiding intervention by the Labor Board for the time being. He attempted to minimize his defeat at a press conference, where he dismissed the burgeoning transcription industry as too small to be of any interest to the AFM. [47]
Several month later, V-Disc director Robert Vincent, with the backing of Pentagon officials, began applying pressure to Petrillo to exempt the V-Disc recording program from the AFM recording ban. Petrillo finally acquiesced on October 27, 1943, but only after insisting on a long list of conditions.
In the meantime, negotiations between AFM officials and a committee comprising representatives of CBS (Columbia), Decca, and RCA had broken down. However, Decca attorney Milton Diamond had continued to meet privately with Petrillo. [48] On September 18, 1943, Decca president Jack Kapp announced that his company and its World Broadcasting transcription subsidiary had signed four-year contracts with the AFM that would allow them to resume recording immediately. [49]
The terms were not immediately disclosed, although within the month Petrillo let it be known that they included payment of a percentage of Decca’s gross revenue directly to the AFM. [50] The proceeds — later revealed to be a flat half-cent royalty per new recording sold — were to be held by AFM officials in an “employment fund” that reportedly would finance make-work projects for AFM members deprived of “normal employment opportunities” because of competition from recorded music. [51]
Capitol Records, which had barely launched before the ban was enacted, capitulated on October 9, agreeing to the same terms as Decca. [52] Four independent transcription companies signed slightly modified agreements several weeks later, amidst accusations from the National Association of Broadcasters that the payment plans were “as economically and socially unsound as extortion is immoral and illegal.” [53]
Many industry observers correctly predicted that other producers would rush to sign with the AFM in a bid to counter Capitol’s and Decca’s early advantage. Within a matter of months, virtually all of the record and transcription capitulated, leaving only RCA and Columbia as the last significant holdouts. “Privately,” Broadcasting magazine reported, “industry leaders made no bones about their feeling that had been ‘sold out’ and are now ‘over a barrel.’” [54]
In April 1944, attorneys for RCA and Columbia called for the War Labor Board to lift the AFM ban and allow their companies to resume recordings, pending a challenge to the AFM’s “employment fund” provision. When a meeting between record-company and AFM officials ended in a stalemate, more radical solutions (including a temporary government takeover of the Columbia and RCA facilities) were floated in some quarters. [55] .
A hostile James Petrillo testifies before the National War Labor Board in 1943.
Facing rapidly escalating pressure from the recording and broadcast industries, the National War Labor Board ordered an end to the AFM ban on June 15, which went unheeded. After Petrillo refused to cooperate at a show-cause hearing on August 18, the case was referred to the Office of Economic Stabilization. President Roosevelt finally weighed in on October 4, 1944, declaring in a strongly worded telegram to Petrillo,
It is the opinion of the Director of Economic Stabilization that under all the present circumstances, the noncompliance by your union is not unduly impeding the war effort. But this noncompliance may encourage other instances of noncompliance which will impede the war effort… Therefore, in the interest of respecting the considered decision of the Board, I request your union to accept the directive orders of the National War Labor Board. What you regard as your loss will certainly be your country’s gain.” [56]
However, it would not be the AFM’s loss. After considering the matter for a week, Petrillo rebuffed the president in a rambling nine-page response. Since virtually every other record and transcription company had already settled with the AFM, Petrillo declared, he saw no reason to offer any concessions to the last two major holdouts. [57] With no alternatives left, Columbia and RCA (including the latter’s NBC Thesaurus transcription division) finally capitulated to Petrillo’s demands on the evening of Saturday, November 11, 1944, with a formal signing set for the following Monday.
After a twenty-eight–month hiatus, RCA resumed commercial recording activities on Sunday, November 12, at 1:43 pm. Columbia followed suit six hours later. [58] RCA recording manager James W. Murray conceded, “We had no alternative but to meet the demands that we make direct payment to the union’s treasury or to abandon our record business.” Columbia’s Edward Wallerstein fixed the blame firmly on Washington lawmakers, declaring, “We are finally accepting because of the government’s unwillingness or incapacity to enforce its orders.” [59]
Although Petrillo denied that the contracts offered to CBS and RCA were punitive, they contained restrictive clauses not found in those the AFM had signed with the more cooperative companies, including a provision that allowed artists to cancel their recording contracts in the event of an AFM strike.
In the end, industry experts estimated that the AFM ban had done little damage to most record companies, and might actually have benefited some. There had been no decline in overall record sales or profits during the ban. Growth within the industry had stalled, but that was attributed less to the ban than to wartime shellac rationing, labor shortages, and the fact that a vast number of record customers were out of the market until their enlistments were up. In addition, Capitol and some other promising newcomers had gained a competitive edge by signing with the AFM and resuming production while the two industry behemoths remained locked in their losing battle with Petrillo. [60]
* * *
Recording companies — whether large, small, or still in the planning stages — would enjoy an unprecedented boom in the postwar years. As early as October 1943, a Billboard columnist had observed,
Old-timers who remember how recording companies mushroomed in the days that followed the wind-up of World War I would blink in amazement if they could peak at the post-war blueprints now being drawn by dozens of minor diskers with major American ambitions. And there’ll be business enough for all of them, in the opinion of one of the most astute and important record men in the field today. No less than 300,000,000 annual record sale is the figure at which he pegs the post-war potential. [61]
Petrillo watched that boom with a growing sense of indignation as record-company profits soared and broadcasters made even greater use of transcriptions. Current AFM contracts, signed at the end of the 1942–1943 recording ban and due to expire on December 31, 1947, were now deemed inadequate in light of the recording industry’s strong rebound and rapid growth.
At the AFM’s summer 1947 convention, Pertrillo once again threatened to shut down all commercial recording activity to force further concessions. Members of the House labor subcommittee immediately launched an investigation into the union, only to have it temporarily squelched by a young Richard Nixon, who favored giving Petrillo “a chance to be a good boy.” [62]
For public consumption, Petrillo made the same case he had in 1942: Recorded music puts “live” musicians out of work, and musicians do not receive a fair proportion of the profits from record companies and jukebox operators. [63] This time, however, there was speculation that Petrillo had a hidden agenda. Suspicions arose that he was using the recording companies as pawns in a scheme to pressure Congress to reject the Lea-Vanderberg and Taft-Hartley acts, which had the potential to undermine some union involvement in both the recording and broadcast fields. [64]
Petrillo was said to be especially concerned with preserving his union’s royalty-funded welfare plan, a concession he had wrung from the record companies at the end of the 1942–1943 ban. Not subject to outside oversight or regulation, the fund was widely rumored to be enriching union officials at the expense of those it was intended to help. Under the proposed Taft-Hartley Act, it would be administered jointly by the AFM and the record companies, with benefits paid directly to the musicians rather than to the AFM — changes that Petrillo was determined to prevent.
If record-industry officials were to join him in lobbying Congress to defeat those bills, Petrillo hinted, then perhaps a new recording ban might be averted. That alliance never materialized, and the Lea-Vanderberg and Taft-Hartley bills were signed into law. Petrillo reacted with his usual barrage of threats, hyperbole, and personal intimidation, declaring that “none of the union’s 220,000 members ever will record again.” [65] But this time, industry officials called his bluff.
The four major producers — Capitol, Columbia, Decca, and RCA — brushed off Petrillo’s threat, claiming to have already stockpiled enough new recordings to sustain them for at least a year (or two, in Capitol’s case). One unnamed record-company executive even welcomed the opportunity a ban would provide to weed out some competitors, telling Billboard,
We have the catalogs the smaller record companies don’t. Should a new record ban develop, Petrillo will be helping us to get rid of small-label competition. We’ll spread “revival” disks all over the market, and the minor companies could not follow suit… Year-long holiday is just what we need to clear up the backlog of orders for old discs. How many of the smaller companies can sweat out a year without new pop diskings? [66]
The same report noted that the record companies were paying $2 million in royalties into the AFM’s welfare fund annually, a large portion of which would dry up in the event of a work stoppage. Petrillo’s threat to launch his own record company evaporated after Justice Department attorneys warned that doing so could cause jeopardize the union’s protected status as a labor organization under the Wagner Act.
After weighing Petrillo’s limited legal options, his increasingly close scrutiny by the federal officials, and the union’s potential financial losses should he impose another recording ban, many record-company executives simply decided to outwait him. Their confidence must have been bolstered considerably in October, after they received an invitation from the National Association of Broadcasters to join them in what was termed “an all-industry front against the AFM.” [67]
Petrillo also made the mistake of tipping his hand far too early. With a full five months remaining on their AFM contracts, the record companies began stockpiling masters at a feverish pace. There was even a song tribute to the effort, Jon and Sondra Steele’s “They All Recorded to Beat the Ban,” which became a surprise hit for the minuscule (and until then, utterly obscure) Damon Recording Studios of Kansas City.
In an attempt to stem the stockpiling, the AFM refused to issue recording licenses to any new companies, many of which found creative ways around that problem. Recording activities reached a new peak in October, when a rumor began circulating that Petrillo might move the ban forward by two months, to November 1.
Anxious producers went on signing sprees and attempted to lure competitors’ stars with better contracts, with Billboard correctly predicting that “the next few weeks may see a good many label switches, in addition to the signing of still more talent.” [68] Universal, a small Chicago start-up, signed three new bands within a week. Aristocrat, a six-month-old race label, added more than a dozen new artists. Mercury talent scout Jimmy Hilliard, although reportedly “well-entrenched” with the label’s existing roster, signed nine new artists, in addition to purchasing masters from the defunct Vogue operation. Transcription producer Frederick W. Ziv, who had just signed a long-term contract with Guy Lombardo when the rumor surfaced, recalled,
We began a frantic race against time… Guy Lombardo and his crew sweated it out with us. We had them over at a New York recording studio virtually day and night. Occasionally we would take half an hour off to eat at a nearby restaurant, but mostly we had food brought in. Sofas and chairs served for cat-naps… We produced enough in the series to give us a respectable backlog and an assurance that our sales force could go out and sell Lombardo to the hilt, which they did. [69]
On the West Coast, some small independent producers threatened to withhold any further royalty payments to the AFM and openly announced plans to record with non-union talent, or to employ union musicians under aliases, as Eli Oberstein had done during the first AFM ban. Coast Records announced that it would step up its importation of Peerless discs from Mexico, and several other small labels hinted that they were already in contact with Mexican suppliers. [70]
Some enterprising individuals planned to cut masters on their own and offer them to the major labels, despite not holding active AFM recording licenses, only to discover that most companies would not accept them for fear of AFM reprisals. [71] That did not deter one Dick Charles, an aspiring songwriter who had a group of high-school musicians record his “Man on the Carousel” in his living room. The Dana label took a chance and issued the recording, with no repercussions reported. “Jocks already have been whirling ‘Carousel,’” Billboard reported, “and copies are due on retail shelves sometime this week.” [72]
November 1 came and went, with no recording ban ordered. By then, however, it appeared certain that the AFM would refuse to renew its record-company contracts, and that the ban would be called on December 31, as originally planned. To skirt the new Taft-Hartley Act and avoid possible intervention by the Justice Department, Petrillo would not officially term the action a strike. Instead, union musicians would be instructed to “merely quit work” on that date. [73]
Richard Nixon, having belatedly realized that Petrillo would not be a “good boy” after all, now insisted that the Justice Department prosecute him and the AFM for conspiracy in restraint of trade if the recording ban was implemented. But he was thwarted by Justice Department attorneys, who after initially expressing puzzlement over Petrillo’s wording, concluded that “quitting work” was not synonymous with “striking,” and therefore was not an issue with which the department should become involved.
Once the ban was in effect, record producers began revisiting strategies that had been developed during the first AFM strike. Non-instrumental accompanists made a comeback, but on a grander scale than previously. For an April 1948 session by Jack Smith and the Clark Sisters, Capitol brought in a sixteen-voice chorus and a band consisting of kazoos and other toy instruments, presumably played by non-union talent. To lend a fuller sound to its vocal offerings by the Sportsmen Quartet, the company overdubbed accompanying tracks by the same group. Tower’s first post-ban session employed an eight-voice chorus, two harmonicas, and a ukulele to accompany singer Jack Owens. The King label recruited the non-union Harmi-Kings harmonica trio. [74]
Several small concerns skirted the ban by licensing European dance-band recordings, on which they overdubbed vocals by American artists. Columbia was quick to point out that it had recently opened a new studio in Mexico City, far beyond the AFM’s reach. Bob Thiele, the president of Signature Records, also announced that he planned to move some recording operations to Mexico. [75] But the largest Mexican recording operation was mounted by Standard Transcriptions, which had employed Mexican musicians during the first AFM ban. During the summer of 1948, Standard president Jerry King announced that his company was planning a Mexican trek that Billboard predicted would be “the largest single recording series yet attempted since the Petrillo ban.” Special arrangements were commissioned so that vocal choruses could be overdubbed by American singers once the masters arrived in the U.S. King also offered to cut masters in Mexico for the other major transcription companies, the only restriction being that arrangements had to differ from those used his own recordings. [76] There were no takers, but that apparently did not deter other producers from floating similar offers. For RCA and Columbia, however, the Mexican option proved to be problematic. Union musicians were already on strike at Victor’s Mexico City operation, and a work stoppage reportedly was being planned for Columbia’s Mexican facilities.
There was a renewed interest in importing foreign-label pop recordings as well. Even before the ban, several companies had begun negotiating for the rights to foreign recordings, albeit primarily for the classical market. Keynote’s John Hammond had already secured U.S. pressing and distribution rights to what were claimed to be ten-thousand Czech recordings, and Capitol was in secret negotiations with Telefunken in Germany for its classical and foreign-language catalogs. Now it was reported that Capitol and Columbia were looking to license foreign pop material as well, from British sources. [77] The idea was largely abandoned after encountering stiff resistance from Hardie Ratcliffe, assistant general secretary of the British Musicians’ Union, and a staunch Petrillo supporter.
Capitol Records, whose launch had been hampered by the earlier AFM action, was the first major label to openly defy the new ban. On February 21, 1948, it was reported that the company had ordered Benny Goodman, Stan Kenton, Wesley Tuttle, and several other popular artists to report for recording sessions in defiance of the ban. Tuttle immediately contacted AFM Local 47 for guidance and was told to ignore Capitol’s order. The situation turned into a standoff as rumors swirled that Capitol was preparing to test the legality of the ban in court. [78]
On the same day the Capitol story broke, Jerry King ordered band-leader Ike Carpenter to report for a February 25 Standard Transcriptions session, openly admitting that he intended to use Carpenter as a “guinea pig” to test the validity of the ban. The matter was referred to AFM Local 47, which made it clear that Carpenter would face expulsion if he reported for the date. [79]
On April 10, 1948, a group of record-company that included James Murray (Victor), Frank White (Columbia), Milton Rackmil (Decca), A. Halsey Cowan (Signature), and Jack Pearl (representing the Phonograph Record Manufacturers’ Association, a consortium of small independent labels) met to discuss the advisability of approaching Petrillo personally. This time, in marked contrast to the earlier AFM ban, the record-company executives did not appear particularly concerned about the situation, nor about appeasing Petrillo. Billboard reported,
No conclusions were reached, but the reps decided to think the matter over and go into it further at another meeting late next week… One disc exec reported that he “don’t much give a damn” about bringing the ban to an early close, and intimated he felt that such was the prevalent attitude among fellow diskers. [80]
The ban dragged on through the summer months, with disbursement and use of royalties paid to the union by record companies the major sticking point. But with the work stoppage was now costing many union members jobs, and crimping the flow of royalties into AFM’s coffers, Petrillo faced mounting internal pressure to resolve the standoff. In September he presented a sketchy proposal under which the royalty payments would be used to fund work for unemployed musicians. Among the many missing details was any mention of the new royalty rates the AFM intended to demand. Several major-label executives reported that they were taking Petrillo’s proposal home for further study but remained noncommittal. [81]
By mid-October, both sides acknowledged that they were at a stalemate. Two weeks later, Petrillo and recording-industry representatives unexpectedly announced that they had agreed to terms of a new contract involving concessions from both sides, but particularly from the beleaguered union boss. An earlier demand for payment of royalties on all discs sold during the ban was dropped, in exchange for which the record companies agreed to a slight increase in the royalty rate for records that retailed for more than a dollar (comprising a small portion of total sales, primarily involving higher-end classical records). The proposed solution, including revisions to the way the royalty fund was administered, was to be submitted to the Justice Department, which would rule on its legality under the Taft-Hartley Act.
By the first week of November, one trade publication was predicting that the first post-ban recordings would begin reaching the market within a matter of days. [82] That prediction proved to be more than a month premature. Recording could not begin until the Justice Department (which had become bogged down in an internal debate over the need to channel the request through the Labor Department) issued its advisory opinion on the new contract.
With approval finally imminent, Billboard reported on November 11 that the record companies were gearing up to resume recording. [83] A new five-year pact was finalized on Monday, November 13, and it was generally expected that record companies would rush to sign with AFM and resume recording, as they had in 1943. However, reactions were mixed among industry officials. At RCA headquarters, the mood was described as “festive.” But when a Billboard reporter encountered Decca’s Jack Kapp enjoying a leisurely lunch and asked why he wasn’t in the recording studio, Kapp replied, “What for? There’s nothing we particularly want to record.” [84]
The small independent labels, many of which were getting by reasonably well with non-union talent, were especially slow to sign. On December 25, Billboard reported, “In New York, indie diskeries have as yet shown no mad rush to take out AFM recording licenses.” On the West Coast, only three independent labels had signed with the AFM by that date. [85]
For union recording artists, the settlement proved to be a mixed blessing. Record-company executives had spent the past year evaluating the strengths and weaknesses of their artists. Not all were welcomed back to the studios when recording resumed, as Billboard reported on Christmas day 1948:
Brandishing fountain pens in one hand and axes in the other, diskery artists-and-repertoire staffs geared for action on the talent front following the inking of the new recording contract. To date, the pens have been mightier than the axes, but it was plainly indicated that the axes should claim a considerable number of victims before the end of the week. Meanwhile, most of the a. and r. [artists and repertoire] men are propounding a “fewer but better” policy. [86]
The settlement effectively marked the end of James Caesar Petrillo’s decade-long rampage against the recording industry. He would go on to mount further skirmishes, particularly against radio and television producers, but would score no significant victories. In 1958, facing a potential revolt among Los Angeles musicians who believed his policies discouraged the hiring of union members by television studios, he resigned as president of the AFM. [87]
Notes
[1] O’Connell, Charles. The Other Side of the Record, pp. 260–261. New York: Alfred A. Knopf (1947).
[2] Selvin, who had begun his recording career in the late ’teens as the director of a popular dance orchestra, was by this time the vice-president of Associated Music Publishers, and a long-time member of the American Federation of Musicians.
[3] “Cost of Record Music Talent Is Found Above Expectations.” Broadcasting (April 14, 1941), p. 54.
[4] “Settlement Talk Rumored After RB Drops Band in Pay Dispute.” Billboard (June 13, 1942), p. 38. The strike involved the main circus band, under Merle Evans’ direction, as well as the smaller sideshow band directed by Arthur Wright.
[5] Ibid.
[6] “Union Head Protests.” Phoenix Arizona Republic (July 14, 1942), p. 2.
[7] “Action Against ‘Canned Music’ Scored by J. L. Fly.” Wilkes-Barre [PA] Times Leader (Jul 21, 1942), p. 2.
[8] “Senate Quiz on Petrillo; Clark and Vandenberg Hits Music ‘Tyranny’ by AFM.” Billboard (September 5, 1942), p. 62.
[9] “Hubbard Labels Petrillo as ‘Fuehrer’ of Musicians, Seeking to Wreck Radio.” Broadcasting (July 27, 1942), p. 8.
[10] “Industry Remains Calm on Petrillo Ban.” Broadcasting (July 13, 1942), p. 12.
[11] “Petrillo to Put Curb on Making of Records.” Chicago Tribune (June 9, 1942), p. 17.
[12] “Highlights of the Petrillo Recording Ban that Went Before; From 1942 to 1944.” Billboard (November 1, 1947), p. 20.
[13] “Mr. Petrillo Gives the Word.” New York Times (July 10, 1942), reprinted in Broadcasting (July 13, 1942), p. 12.
[14] U. S. Trust Suit Against Petrillo on Recording Bar.” St. Louis Dispatch (Jul 23, 1942), p. 1.
[15] “Hubbard Labels Petrillo as ‘Fuehrer’ of Musicians,” op. cit.
[16] “Shellac Shortage, Petrillo and War Have Little Fellows Groggy.” Billboard (August 29, 1942), p. 19.
[17] “Senate Quiz on Petrillo,” op. cit.
[18] “D of J Must Prove That AFM Conspires; ‘Labor Disputes’ Can’t Be Hit By Trust Laws.” Billboard (August 1, 1942), p. 19.
[19] “The Petrillo Decision.” Reno [NV] Gazette-Journal (Oct 16, 1942), p. 4.
[20] “Chronological Chart of Events in the A.F.M. Record Ban.” The Billboard 1944 Music Yearbook, p. 147.
[21] Coughlan, Robert. “Petrillo.” Life (August 3, 1942), pp. 68–70, 72, 74, 76.
[22] “75% of People Against Petrillo.” Billboard (September 5, 1942), p. 62.
[23] “Independents Form Record Association.” Broadcasting (August 10, 1942), p. 58.
[24] “Tiny Disker Tries to Steal Play from Big Firms with Petrillo Personally, But No Dice.” Billboard (April 3, 1943).
[25] “AFM Rejects Plan.” Broadcasting (March 29, 1943). P. 52.
[26] “Musicraft Asks Petrillo Again, Get Second ‘No.’” Billboard (April 10, 1943), p. 22
[27] Chasins, Gladys. “Recording Ban Grows Tighter; Vocalists Agree to Stop Recording Until AFM Lifts Ban.” Billboard (July 3, 1943).
[28] “Petrillo Won’t Settle Individually with Diskers; April 15 Meeting Set.” Variety (March 31, 1943), p. 35.
[29] “Petrillo Stands Pat.” Billboard (January 16, 1943), p. 20.
[30] “Tune Pile Getting Low.” Billboard (October 31, 1942), p. 62.
[31] Chasins, Gladys. “Recording Ban Grows Tighter; Vocalists Agree to Stop Recording Until AFM Lifts Ban.” Billboard (July 3, 1943).
[32] Chasins, op. cit.
[33] Quoted in Angus, Robert: “Pirates, Prima Donas, and Plain White Wrappers.” High Fidelity (December 1976). An attempt by researcher George Blacker in the 1980s to discover the anonymous music directors’ identity was unsuccessful.
[34] Pee Wee Irwin reportedly told writer Roy Evans that he was responsible for the Willie Kelly side.
[35] Evans, Roy. Undated letter to George Blacker (William R. Bryant Papers, Mainspring Press collection).
[36] Hit 7023, released on October 14, 1942.
[37] “Big Recording Whodunit; 802 to Investigate Oberstein’s Recording of Mysterious Bands.” Billboard (October 17, 1942), p. 20.
[38] “Whither Disk Biz, Petrillo?” Billboard (July 26, 1947), p. 23.
[39] “Discs Cut in Mexico, Says EO.” Down Beat (November 1, 1942). Oberstein apparently did have connections with one or more Mexican studios, as evidenced by the earlier release of some Mexico City recordings on his Varsity label; but “Der Fuehrer’s Face” appears to have been recorded in the same American studio as Hit’s pre-ban recordings, and the voice was unmistakably that of Arthur Fields, who is highly unlikely to have journeyed from New York to Mexico City just to fill a recording date for a cut-rate label. In a bizarre twist, Fields himself reportedly filed for an injunction to halt sales and distribution of the record (“Now Oberstein Says Discs Are Mexican.” Billboard, October 31, 1942, p. 21). Little more was reported on the case, but based on the large number of surviving copies of Hit 7023, it seems unlikely the injunction was granted.
[40] “Discs Cut…,” op. cit.
[41] “Big Recording Whodunit,” op cit.
[42] “Oberstein Defends Records.” Billboard (October 31, 1942), p. 62.
[43] Ibid.
[44] “Oberstein’s ‘Peter Piper’ May Be 802’s Jack Small; Union Wants Some Answers.” Billboard (January 16, 1943), p. 20.
[45] Oberstein was later re-admitted to the union, but only after threatening to file a half-million dollar defamation suit against Petrillo, the AFM, and its officers, raising fears that “a lot of dirty linen will be washed in public” (“Obie Planning 500G Suit”; Billboard, July 10, 1943). Obertein’s Classic Records recording license was restored in early November 1943 (“AFM Okays Classic Recording License;” Billboard, November 13, 1943, p. 16).
[46] “Calls on Pubs to Put Screws on Black Market Recorders.” Billboard (June 5, 1943), p. 21.
[48] Robertson, Bruce.“Disc Meeting Discusses Performance Fee.” Broadcasting (August 9, 1943), p. 12.
[49] “Petrillo’s Permission.” Motion Picture Herald (September 25, 1943), p. 8. The AFM contracts signed by Decca, World Broadcasting, and the many companies that followed were effective as of January 1, 1944, but Petrillo allowed those companies to resume recording immediately upon signing.
[50] Robertson, Bruce. “Other Disc Firms May Yield to AFM Pact.” Broadcasting (October 4, 1943), p. 9.
[51] Ibid.
[52] “Capitol Records Signs with AFM.” Broadcasting (October 18, 1943), p. 60.
[53] “NAB Hits AFM Fees; Four Disc Firms Sign.” Broadcasting (October 25, 1943), p. 9.
[54] Robertson, “Other Disc Firms,” op. cit.
[55] “Editorial: Jimmy’s Opportunities.” Broadcasting (October 9, 1944), p. 44.
[56] “FDR Telegram to Petrillo.” Broadcasting (October 9, 1944).
[57] “Chronological Chart of Events in the A.F.M. Record Ban,” op cit.
[58] Ibid.
[59] Stone, Floyd E. “Victorious Caesar Petrillo Talks; Hollywood Waits.” Motion Picture Herald (November 18, 1944), p. 13.
[60] “Ban Background and Effects.” The Billboard 1944 Music Year Book, p. 146.
[61] “Post-War Deluge of Diskers.” Billboard (October 2, 1943), p. 1
[62] “AFM ‘Stop Work’ Disk Move Irks Congressmen But It Puzzles Justice Department.” Billboard (October 25, 1947), p. 17.
[63] “For the Record — Mr. Petrillo.” Billboard (January 17, 1948), p. 25.
[64] “Whither Disk Biz, Petrillo? Waxers Seen as Pawns in Larger Strategy by AFM, But Big Firms Hold Aces.” Billboard (July 26, 1947), pp. 3, 23.
[65] “Petrillo Says He’s Obeying Taft-Hartley.” Billboard (October 25, 1947), p. 17.
[66] Ibid., p 23
[67] “NAB Bids for Disker Reps.” Billboard (October 25, 1947), p. 17.
[68] “Ban Starts Wax Talent Flurry; Rush Is On to Beat Deadline.” Billboard (Ocotber 25, 1947), p. 34.
[69] Ziv, Frederick W. “It Could Only Be Done with Discs.” Audio Record (June–July 1948), pp. 1, 3.
[70] “Small Coast Labels Talk ‘Bootleg’ Wax as Big Countermove to Petrillo.” Billboard (November 1, 1947), p. 22.
[71] “Check the Angles!” Billboard (December 20, 1947), p. 20.
[72] “High School Tootlers Heard on Dana Disk.” Billboard (May 8, 1948), p. 21.
[73] “Dec. 31 Disk Ban Due Hourly; Petrillo Nix on Recordings Held Certain.” Billboard (October 18, 1947), p. 17.
[74] “Ban Side-Stepping Quickens.” Billboard (April 10, 1948), p. 17.
[75] “Dec. 31 Disk Ban Due Hourly,”op. cit.
[76] “Standard Treks to Mexico for Wax-Cutting Session.” Billboard (July 3, 1948), p. 37.
[77] “Ban Side-Stepping Quickens,” op. cit.
[78] “Cap Orders Talent to Wax Despite Ban.” Billboard (February 28, 1948), pp. 3, 17.
[79] “Ike Carpenter Guinea Pig in Petrillo Case.” Billboard (February 28, 1948), pp. 3, 17.
[80] “Diskers Weight Bid to Petrillo to Raise Ban.” Billboard (April 17, 1948), p. 32.
[81] “Petrillo’s Latest Proposal Gives Lawyers a Workout.” Billboard (September 25, 1948),p. 36.
[82] “Petrillo, Record Firms Agree; To End Union Ban.” Motion Picture Herald (November 6, 1948), p. 34.
[83] “Diskeries Set to Cut; A&R Men Polish Ax.” Billboard (December 18, 1948), p. 3.
[84] “A PS (Petrillo and Sarnoff) to Ban’s End; Other Assorted Items.” Billboard (December 25, 1948), p. 3.
[85] Coast Diskers Cold-Shoulder New Recording.” Billboard (January 1, 1949), p. 40.
[86] “Talent Roster Revamping Started by A. & R. Staffers.” Billboard (December 25, 1948), p. 21.
[87] Serrin, William. “James Petrillo Dead; Led Musicians.” New York Times (October 25, 1984), p. 15.
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.Burlesque star Winnie Garrett (a.k.a. “The Flaming Redhead”) served as vice-president and promotions manager of Famous Records beginning in 1947 and was running company by 1948, while continuing to perform on the side.
To all appearances, the Famous Record Company was a rather dodgy operation. Its first label design was copied from Brunswick’s long-abandoned 1920 version, although there was no connection to that company. Even the company name was copied; it had been used several years earlier by an unrelated New York venture that briefly marketed cheap cardboard picture discs featuring sound-track excerpts by Hollywood stars. Famous received little coverage in the trade papers, and early labels gave its location only as “U.S.A.” (its mailing address was Room 303 of the RKO Theater Building at 6 Market Street, in Newark, New Jersey). .
The original Famous label was copied from Brunswick’s long-abandoned 1920 design, although there was no connection to that company. It was later redesigned.
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To date, no reliable contemporary account of the Famous Record Company’s launch has been found. Its initial releases — four sides by Phil Napoleon’s Orchestra, accompanying singers Ross Leonard and Roma Lynn — were reviewed in late November 1944 by Billboard critic M. H. Orodenker, who delivered a mixed verdict:
“Still another disk label enters the fold, this one springing from Newark, N. J. For its bow, [it] brings back Phil Napoleon for the music making… Napoleon provides a highly attractive setting for the romantic baritoning of Ross Leonard. Warbler goes all out in dramatic style for “I Dream of You,” dragging it out no end and negating much of the disk appeal of one of the better ballads of the moment. However, Leonard listens to better advantage when keeping within rhythmic confines for two new ballads… Remaining side, an innocuous rhythm ditty in ‘Rhythm Has Got You Too,” provides the hot hymnaling of Roma Lynn. However, none in the company can distinguish themselves with the song.”
Famous’ artist roster, consisting largely of second- and third-tier names drawn from New York–area nightclubs, was soon expanded to include Jerry Delmar’s Orchestra, Margie Hudson, Jim Messner, and Tommy Ryan. But the Famous Record Company did virtually no national advertising, and little more was heard of the venture until early 1947, when it resurfaced in Billboard‘s manufacturers’ directory as Famous Records, Inc.
Operating at the same Newark address, the reorganized company launched a new series of Famous records, with redesigned labels, in the autumn of 1947. The company secured several new distributors and began advertising on a modest scale, primarily to jukebox operators. Unfortunately, it was not an opportune time to relaunch the business, with the second American Federation of Musicians’ recording ban looming. The trade papers were filled with accounts of record companies stockpiling masters in advance of the ban, but Famous failed to take that precaution — a misstep that ultimately would contribute to its downfall.
The first release in Famous’ new FA-600 series (“The Stars Were Mine” / “Are You Havin’ Any Fun,” by Freddy Miller’s Orchestra) earned faint praise from a Cash Box reviewer in November 1947 as a “pair of sides that ops [jukebox operators] may use to fair advantage.” .
The redesigned Famous label and a November 1947 ad for the new FA-600 series, launched at around the time of Winnie Garrett’s buy-in. Freddy Miller and Janet Parker were among the Famous artists that Garrett took to Connecticut for an appearance on behalf of the Damon Runyon Memorial Cancer Fund in March 1948.
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Among the reorganized company’s investors was Winnie Garrett, a twenty-five year-old burlesque and strip-tease star who billed herself as “The Flaming Redhead.” News reports suggest that Garrett bought into the company in or around November 1947, just as the label was being relaunched. Garrett was made vice-president and promotions manager, although no evidence has been found that she had any experience in the record business. Billboard reported that Famous paid her so little that she could not afford to retire from the stage. Instead, she juggled two careers, representing Famous Records by day while continuing to work the strip-clubs and burlesque houses by night. .
Famous Records reportedly paid Garrett so little that she continued to perform on the side.
Initially, Garrett’s main duty was to convince disc jockeys to plug Famous records on the air, but by 1948 she was taking a more active role in the operation. In March of that year, she and several Famous artists traveled to Bridgeport, Connecticut, for an appearance on behalf of the Damon Runyon Memorial Cancer Fund. In June, she sued 20th Century Fox for $150,000 over its portrayal of a fictitious “Famous Records” company (which goes bankrupt in the film, “You Were Meant for Me”), alleging damage to her company’s financial reputation. By then, reporters had taken to referring to Garrett as the “head” of Famous Records, without specifying exactly what that might entail.
Famous had failed to stockpile masters in advance of the American Federation of Musicians’ recording ban, and new releases dwindled as the work stoppage dragged on. Garrett appears to have undertaken an image makeover at that time, presenting a toned-down version of her act with mixed results. In November 1948, she was arrested at New York’s Club Ha-Ha for presenting a “lewd and indecent performance.” The incident was widely covered by the local papers:
“[Garrett] told reporters the performance that led to her arrest early today was an ‘interpretive dance.’ At first she wasn’t sure just what it interpreted, but finally decided it has ‘a little African in it’… She explains that she begins the dance wearing an evening dress, gloves, three brassieres, an under-skirt, and peace-net panties. She ends, she said, with one brassiere and g-string panties.”
The charges were dropped after the arresting officer admitted that Garrett had not been totally nude, as he had originally thought. After noting that the same performance had failed to raise any objections in staid Boston, Garrett promised to further clean up her act and invited the officer to visit the Club Ha-Ha every night to make sure her dance was “more conservative.” We don’t know if he took her up on the offer.
In May 1950, Garrett sued photographer Murray Korman for mental anguish and distress after he placed semi-nude photographs of her on some penny peep-machines. By then, Famous Records appears to have been inactive for some time, having failed to garner much attention for anything other than Garrett’s presence. She continued to perform into the mid-1950s but had no further involvement with the record business.
“Burlesque.” Billboard (Mar 27, 1948), p. 43.
“Charges Against Strip-Tease Dancer Dismissed in Court.” St. Cloud [MN] Times (Nov 25, 1948), p. 10.
“Film Company Sued.” Bridgewater (NJ) Courier-News (May 19, 1948), p. 9.
Orondenker, M. H. “Popular Record Reviews.” Billboard (Dec 9, 1944), p. 21.
“Sales Talk Louder Than Words” (ad). Cash Box (Nov 15, 1947), p. 18.
“Strip-Teaser Brings Suit as Record Company Head.” Tampa [FL] Times (Jun 1, 1948), p. 1
“Winnie the Waxer.” Billboard (Mar 13, 1948), p. 16.
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In May 1934, Boris Morros, a musical director at Paramount Pictures, was secretly contacted by a member of the Soviet Union’s People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs (NKVD), which under orders from the Kremlin was attempting to plant Russian operatives throughout Hollywood. Vasily M. Zubilin was assigned to be Morros’ “handler.”
A decade later, Zubilin arranged for American Soviet operatives Alfred K. and Martha Dodd Stern to buy into Morros’ music-publishing operation. With $130,000 from the Sterns, Morros launched the American Recording Artists (ARA) label, which (in addition to producing some fairly decent records) served as a cover for an extensive Soviet spy ring. The Russian’s involvement with ARA went undetected, and label was a success — at least briefly.
Morros redeemed himself on July 14, 1947, when he disclosed details of the operation to the FBI. In return for a promise from the Justice Department not to prosecute, he agreed to serve as a double agent, reporting on Soviet intelligence efforts for the next ten years.
Born in Russia, Boris Morros studied music under Rimsky-Korsokov in St. Petersburg, then moved to France following the 1917 revolution, leaving his family behind. In 1922 he brought the Chauve Souris revue to the United States, decided to stay, and was granted citizenship. By the early 1930s, he had moved to Hollywood and was working for Paramount Pictures as an entry-level musical director.
In May 1934, Morros was secretly contacted by a member of the People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs (NKVD), who requested his help in planting Russian operatives throughout Hollywood. Vasily M. Zubilin was assigned to be his handler, but the relationship soured after it was discovered that Morros had greatly overstated his credentials and degree of influence within the movie industry. The Russians stayed in touch, however.
.Boris Morros in the late 1930s
Morros advanced quickly at Paramount, and by 1940 he was a well-known figure in Hollywood. With his newfound celebrity, he once again caught the attention of the Soviets. In December 1941, he was contacted again by the NKVD, who blackmailed him into organizing covers for two Soviet spies. In exchange, the Soviets agreed to stop harassing some of Morros’ family members who remained in Russia. In March 1944, Zubilin assigned NKVD officer Jack Soble to be Morros’ new “handler.” “Our comrade,” Zubilin told Soble, “is completely devoted to the Motherland and is one of our most trusted and loyal agents.”
As part of his cover, Morros launched a publishing house, the Boris Morros Music Company. The affiliated American Recording Artists label was launched a short time later, with $130,000 in funding from American Soviet sympathizers Alfred K. and Martha Dodd Stern. Soble found Morros’ office to be “a big, showy, elaborate place, in keeping with his flamboyant personality and expensive tastes. The record laboratory, however, was a tiny rented place.”
Alfred Stern was awarded presidency of the new record company. He was ordered fill sales positions with as many undercover Soviet agents as possible, while Morros was left to handle the recording operation and present an “American” front to the public.
As Soble later confessed, the entire operation was “a ‘blind’ for a widespread Soviet espionage network. Bosses and “salesmen” [were] Russian intelligence agents… The stars, of course, had no way of knowing that they were being used as attractive window-dressing for an outfit organized to be a clearinghouse for spies throughout the United States, Canada, Central and South America.”
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ARA records were heavily promoted; this ad is from September 1945. As Jack Soble later confirmed, ARA’s stars had no idea their label was a front for Soviet espionage.
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The Russian’s involvement with ARA went undetected. Gullible members of the press lauded the new operation as a promising addition to the growing roster of independent West Coast labels. The company’s first releases, announced in late June 1944, sold well. With extensive contacts in the entertainment industry, Morros assembled an impressive artist roster that came to include Hoagy Carmichael, Frances Langford, Smiley Burnette, Phil Harris, Art Tatum, and Bob Crosby’s Bobcats. Widely advertised, the records were handled by many major national distributors.
Within a few months of ARA’s launch, however, a personality clash between Morros and Stern began to take its toll. Another Soviet agent, Stephan Ghoundenko (a.k.a. “The Professor”), was brought in to straighten out the difficulties. Stern resigned and was replaced by Mark Leff. Morros soon appeared to lose interest in the company, turning management and artists-and-repertoire duties over to his son Richard and a new hire, Dave Gould.
A short time later, Soble received a one-word message from Moscow: “Dissolve.” Morros refused, instead paying back $100,000 of the Sterns’ loan and soldiering on. Stern’s warning to his superiors that Morros could no longer be trusted went largely unheeded. He was allowed to remain in the spy ring, as a courier, while remaining the nominal head of ARA.
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The ARA label underwent several redesigns during its relatively short existence.
To all outward appearances, ARA was an American success story. The company was reorganized in March 1946, as ARA, Inc., coinciding with its purchase of Symphony Records (a small West Coast classical label that featured the Santa Monica Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Jacques Rachmilovich) and its expansion into the children’s and country-and-western markets. But problems were beginning to surface. That summer, the pressing plant was closed, ostensibly to take inventory, and it did not reopen.
Despite Leff’s insistence that the hiatus was temporary, new releases and advertising were scaled back. In July, Leff announced that he was selling his interest in ARA to an undisclosed firm or firms. Late in the month, Billboard reported that ARA’s operations were “practically at a standstill now,” with an investment of more than $75,000 tied up in recordings that had yet to be released. By then, rumors were circulating that Cosmo Records was contemplating a takeover.
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Originally a pop and jazz label, ARA later expanded into the classical, children’s, and country-and-western markets.
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Hoagy Carmichael was the first of several ARA artists to defect, moving to Decca in August 1946. Later that month, a group headed by music publisher Ralph Peer made an offer to acquire the company. It was declined, as was a subsequent offer by Apollo Records. ARA, Inc., was placed in receivership in September 1946, just in time to thwart a seizure by the Internal Revenue Service.
ARA’s assets were scheduled to be auctioned piecemeal on October 22, 1946, but the sale was called off after a tangle of legal problems (including questions over whether ARA’s masters were unencumbered and could be reused without restrictions) surfaced. The sale was postponed until November 25, 1946, when all of ARA’s property was auctioned in Los Angeles by order of the U.S. District Court. The masters’ legal status would remain in limbo for several more years.
By late 1946, litigation surrounding ARA was running rampant. An audit had revealed many irregularities in the company’s operations, including some suspicious loan repayments to three of Leff’s other companies. In January 1947, former ARA treasurer Irving Zeitlin was subpoenaed to explain the firm’s erratic accounting methods, a procedure that Billboard estimated could “drag out for months because of many loose ends connected with operation of the former waxery.” Civil suits continued to be filed for several more years.
In the meantime, Morros’ conscience had gotten the better of him, and he had quietly turned on his handlers. On July 14, 1947, he informed the FBI of his activities for the Russians. In return for a promise from the Justice Department not to prosecute, he agreed to serve as a double agent, reporting on Soviet intelligence efforts. Still posing as a Soviet courier, Morros developed a friendship with U.S. Army Intelligence officer George Zlatkovski and his wife Jane, who were actually Soviet agents. Morros continued to meet with Soble and the Zlatkovskis, in the U.S. and abroad, through October 1954.
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The Sterns and Morros at the time of the 1957 trial
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Morros’ involvement with the Russians and the FBI remained a well-guarded secret until January 1957, when U.S. Attorney Paul W. Williams indicted Jack Soble, along with his wife Myra and associate Jacob Albam, on charges of seeking U.S. defense secrets for transmission to the Soviet government. A month later, it was disclosed that Morros (whose whereabouts were said to be unknown) would act as a key prosecution witness in the case. The Sobles and Albam were convicted and given prison sentences. The Sterns, summoned to appear before a grand jury, refused extradition from Mexico and were fined $50,000 for contempt. The identities of at least fourteen other Soviet agents, some of whom held embassy posts in the U.S., were exposed during the course of the trial.
By the summer of 1957, Morros had offers from two studios to produce a movie about his exploits and was being praised by the press as “an incredibly brave American.” His 1959 autobiography, My 10 Years as a Counterspy (co-authored with Samuel Charters) served as the basis for the 1960 film, “Man on a String.” Morros died in New York on January 8, 1963.
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Boris Morros Recalls Russia’s Strong-Arm Tactics During his Time at ARA Records (1944 – 1945)
A brief excerpt from Morros’ memoir, My Ten Years as a Counterspy (New York: Viking Press, 1959)
“That summer [1944] it became known all over the music trade that I had latched on to an angel with a wide-open checkbook. I was even approached with offers to buy Muzak, the company that supplies “canned music” to restaurants and hotels all over the country. We visited ex-Senator William E. Benton of Connecticut, who was then an official of the Muzak corporation, but Stern, who was the one who would put up the money, decided that the price of $600,000 asked for the properties was too high. He would go no higher than $400,000…
“During August, Stern visited Hollywood, and I made the astonishing discovery that he already knew more about music, both artistically and commercially, than Paul Whiteman, myself, and Stravinsky combined. Meanwhile, I had surmounted many of our difficulties, and records were being produced. That fall we had a hit recording by Joe Reichman’s band. This was “Nobody’s Home on the Range,” a travesty of the song “Home on the Range,” which had boomed into renewed popularity because it was President Roosevelt’s favorite.
“But Stern disapproved of almost everything we were doing. He disliked my office staff, including my sales manager. He wanted the man discharged, and wished me to switch control of the sales department to his office. Above all, he thought that we should concentrate on songs of a more cultural type. For example, he disapproved of “Chattanooga Choo Choo” as a vulgar title, and predicted it would never be popular. He asked a million questions such as “Why don’t we sign up Bing Crosby instead of his brother Bob?” It was tiresome to have to point out that someone had had the same idea years before.
“This was the man to whom I had to explain a few months before what a bar of music was, what the refrain was, the man who asked the usual foolish question, “What is written first—the words or the music?”
“All that fall Stern showered me with daily letters of five to eight pages each. On hearing that we needed record-pressing equipment, he rushed out and bought $17,000 worth of second-hand presses that were so outmoded they could not be used.
“I am afraid I was not very patient with my vice-president. By this time I had three shifts working in our little plant. They were turning out thirty thousand platters a day. They had to. Our “Nobody’s Home on the Range” record was headed for the hit class.
“Shortly after the partnership arrangement started, both Soble and Stern began pressing me to open a branch in Mexico City. They were still at it, though I had stalled that deal with the argument that before we could do any such thing we must have enough numbers to distribute to Justify a catalogue. However, I was getting more infuriated every day with Stern’s silly letters of abuse and criticism. By now he was disapproving not only of the songs but of the arrangements.
“At the end of the year I decided that life was too short to bother with this money man, and so informed Soble. But it was not until March—this was in 1945—that Jack decided he must do something to calm down both of us. He came with Stern to California to settle our differences. They arrived toward the end of the month and visited the plant.
“‘He is a musical ignoramus on all levels,” I told Soble. “I feel it is impossible to go along with him. The only thing we can do now is to break up this ridiculous partnership.’
“‘Artistic temperament!” clucked Jack Soble.
“The next day they came back to the plant. When the angry words started to fly all over again, Soble suggested that we go to my home in Beverly Hills. I suppose he did not want our employees to hear the dispute. My visitors stayed in Hollywood about a week. Soble, trying to act as peacemaker, kept repeating that the Cause was the one thing that counted, not my petty grievances or Alfred’s. We Just had to get along.
“I have never pretended to be an even-tempered man. During that stormy week I called Stern every foul name I could think of in all the languages I knew—and I know profanity as it is spoken and spluttered around the world. Stern, the Harvard man, just sat there and took it with the uncomprehending look of a hurt child.
“When the week was over with the issue unresolved, Soble said he had to get back to New York. But he was sure that some way to reconcile our differences would occur to him. He asked me to go with them on their trip East so that we would have further talks while traveling. I got a compartment that connected with the drawing room they shared.
“En route Soble came up with what he considered the sure-fire solution: if I would agree to continue working with Stern he would invest another $100,000 in the company.
“I refused this, telling Soble, “I don’t want any more of his money. In fact I would be happy to buy back his twenty-five-percent share of the business for what he paid for it.”
“‘This is going to make Vasya Zubilin very, very angry,’ Soble said. ‘I’m afraid that he will be very hard on your family in Russia —unless you cooperate.'”
“‘You said you were going to investigate this whole matter,’ I reminded him. ‘You have not been impartial. What I want is a simple thing: to be left alone to do my job, unbothered by nincompoops.'” I glared at Stern.
“On reaching New York, we had a final meeting at the Tavern-on-the-Green Restaurant. When it ended, we were as far apart as ever.
“A couple of nights later Martha Dodd Stern visited me in my hotel room at the Sherry-Netherland. She was all sweetness and light. Martha blamed herself for neglecting to take a more active part in the business. ‘If I had, Boris,’ she said, ‘there would have been no such misunderstandings between you two tried and true Communists.’ She kept pounding at the point Soble had: The welfare of the Party should be our only consideration.
“‘Sorry, Martha, my dear,’ I said, ‘you are being very charming and sweet, wistful and feminine—but too many wrong things have been done, too many said.’
“My lawyers began drawing up the papers for dissolving the partnership in April. I paid Stern $100,000 for his one-quarter interest in the Boris Morros Company and its record-making subsidiary, American Recording Artists.
“He rendered an account of how the $30,000 allotted him had been spent. I was amazed to see that he had given Zubilin $5,000 cash and charged it to the company. He had also charged petty items, including the purchase of a record player and two dozen tennis balls for Zubilin, as well as the full cost of his and Soble’s trip to Hollywood.
“But I was glad to get rid of him. I thought I was also extricating myself from Jack Soble’s spy ring. To put it mildly, I was being naively optimistic.
“I had been willing to pay a high price for the privilege of disassociating myself. To raise the $100,000 in cash to pay off Stern, I was forced to sell my share of a film property. But they still wished me to engage in a new venture with Alfred K. Stern.
“Jack Soble kept coming to see me. ‘What can I do, Boris?’ he said. ‘You have put me in the difficult position of having to write a bad report on you to Moscow. I am holding it back. I am afraid that Zubilin will be unable to control himself when he hears that you have split up with Alfred. I’d hate to feel responsible for the extermination of your relatives in Russia. Wouldn’t you?'”
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Bundschu, Barbara. “Walked Double-Dealing Tightrope: Film Producer Broke Spy Ring.” Camden [NJ] Courier-Post (Jul 11, 1957), p. 1.
“ARA Into Longhair Disks.” Billboard (Jun 29, 1946), p. 38.
“ARA Into Receivership; Will Go on Block Piecemeal After Audit.” Billboard (Sep 28, 1946), p. 16.
“ARA to Hold Bankruptcy Sale.” Cash Box (Nov 11, 1946), p. 17.
“Bankruptcy Referee Calls ARA Treasurer to Explain Accounts.” Billboard (Jan 11, 1947), p. 14.
“Boris Morros Dies.” Billboard (Jan 26, 1963), p. 4.
“50G Repaid to Other Leff Corporations Questioned by Trustee in ARA Hassle.” Billboard (Nov 23, 1946), p. 14.
“Key Spy Case Figure Named.” Baltimore Sun (Feb 26, 1957), p. 1.
“Leff Selling Interest in ARA Waxery.” Billboard (Jul 27, 1946), p. 20.
“Masters Free, Clear, Says ARA Receiver.” Billboard (Oct 26, 1946), p. 40.
Morros, Boris (with Charles Samuels). My Ten Years as a Counterspy. New York: Viking Press (1959).
“Morrros Cuts First Disks.” Billboard (Jul 1, 1944), p. 17.
“Morros Jr. Pacts 3 Names for ARA.” Billboard (Nov 24, 1945), p. 20.
“New Indie Pops.” Cash Box (Oct 13, 1947), p. 25.
“Public Judicial Auction Sale by Order of the United States District Court” (legal notice).Cash Box (Nov 11, 1946), p. 18
“Radio Interests, MGM Named in ARA Talk.” Billboard (Aug 3, 1946), p. 18.
Soble, Jack (with Jack Lotte).”How I Spied on United States.” St. Louis Post-Dispatch (Nov 17, 1957), p. 167.
— . “How Spy Ring Got in the Music Business.” St. Louis Post-Dispatch (Nov 20, 1957), p. 63.
— . “Husband-Wife Spy Team in Action.” St. Louis Post-Dispatch (Nov 28, 1957), p. 70.
— . “Low Form of Soviet Union Spy Life.” St. Louis Post-Dispatch (Nov 24, 1957), p. 110.
Wilson, Earl. “Boris Morros’ Undercover Story.” Delaware County Daily Times (Jun 14, 1957), p. 41.
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