Computers & Business Machines

Graphophone

Description

This is a business dictation machine that uses wax cylinders to record and play back sound. The basic design for the machine emerged from research at the Volta Laboratory, Washington, D.C., the sound research facility established by Alexander Graham Bell with his associates Chichester Bell and Charles Sumner Tainter.

Tainter refined the design, patented several versions of it, and oversaw the manufacturing of the first six experimental graphophones at Bergmann & Co in New York in 1885. He also supervised the making of commercial models in a sewing machine factory in Bridgeport, Conn., beginning in 1887. In these early commercial machines, the dictation apparatus sits atop a sewing machine table and employs a treadle to rotate the mandrel holding the cylinder recording.

On this machine from 1888, the treadle is marked "American Graphophone Company"; the governor is marked "Patented July 20th 1886." The recorder-reproducer is marked: "The Phonograph-Graphophone m'f'd by the American Graphophone Company for Jesse H. Lippincott, Sole Licensee/ Type C No. 03042" and numerous patent dates.

Reference:

Wile, Raymond R. "The Development of Sound Recording at the Volta Laboratory," Association for Recorded Sound Collections Journal 21, No. 2, 1990, pp. 208-225.

Location

Currently not on view

date made

ca 1888

maker

American Graphophone Company

ID Number

ME.287825

catalog number

287825

accession number

58498

Data Source

National Museum of American History

McGill Cash Register Patent Model

Description

This is the patent model for U.S. patent 350,986, for a cash register. It has a pine box for a base and a wooden case that covers the mechanism and the back part of the box. Four notched metal wheels, mounted vertically, represent tens of dollars, dollars, tens of cents, and cents. Rotating the wheels forward enters digits, which appear in windows to the left of the wheels.

Moving a knob on the front of the machine raises the case, which is hinged to the box at the back. This reveals the cash register mechanism, including a bell. It also shows the inside of the box, which contains several loose parts. One of these is a broken wooden disc that has a paper disc pasted to it with 26 letters around the edge (not in alphabetical order). The digits from 0 to 9 are listed next to 10 of the letters. This wheel may well not be part of the model. The patent tag with drawing and description is attached to the cash register.

William C. McGill (1812–1890) was born in Berks County, Pa., and spent his early years at sea. He went to California at the time of the Gold Rush, then to Australia, and then to St. Louis. In 1860, he moved to Cincinnati, and soon was assisting in organizing the first company of military volunteers in that city. After the Civil War, he was a guard at the District of Columbia jail until he resigned in 1882 because of poor health. He reportedly was the first patentee of the bell punch and devoted most of his later years to his inventions.

References:

W. C. McGill, "Cash Register," U.S. Patent 350,986, October 19, 1886.

Washington Post, August 23, 1890 (obituary).

Location

Currently not on view

date made

1886

patentee

McGill, William C.

maker

McGill, William C.

ID Number

MA.309344

accession number

89797

catalog number

309344

Data Source

National Museum of American History

George W. N. Yost Typewriter Patent Model

Description

This typewriter patent model was used by George W.N. Yost in his patent application that received patent number 408,061 on July 30th, 1889. The patent claimed several improvements to typewriter machines including a combination of the carriage and line-spacing apparatus with a lever used for line and letter spacing, the “combination of two extra key levers and connecting rods with the platen transverse reciprocating apparatus of a type-writing machine and a series of key-levers for operating the type-bars located between said extra key-levers.”

Location

Currently not on view

patent date

1889-07-30

inventor

Yost, George W. N.

ID Number

ME.308638

catalog number

308638

patent number

408061

accession number

89797

patent number

408,061

Data Source

National Museum of American History

George W. N. Yost Typewriter Patent Model

Description

This typewriter patent model accompanied George W.N. Yost’s patent application that received patent number 343,655 on June 15th 1886. The patent covered a type-writing machine with adjustable type bars arranged in two curved rows, with an inking ribbon situated between the two rows that moved in concert with the carriage.

Location

Currently not on view

date made

1886

patent date

1886-06-15

inventor

Yost, George W. N.

ID Number

ME.308635

catalog number

308635

patent number

349,349

accession number

89797

patent number

343,655

Data Source

National Museum of American History

Experimental Graphophone and Recording

Description

This is an experimental machine for recording sound with a vertically cut wax record on its cylinder. It was made as a demonstration piece at the Volta Laboratory, Washington, DC, in September 1881. The machine is a modified Edison phonograph. The grooves of the machine’s cylinder have been widened and coated with wax. A hand-written card attached to the machine with sealing wax reads: “The following words and sounds are recorded upon the cylinder of this Graphophone: ‘T-r-r—T-r-r—There are more things in heaven and earth Horatio, than are dreamed of in our philosophy—T-r-r—I am a Graphophone and my mother was a Phonograph.’”

This machine and recording were part of the proof of invention that the Volta Associates—Alexander Graham Bell, his cousin Chichester Bell, and Charles Sumner Tainter—deposited in a sealed tin box at the Smithsonian on October 30, 1881, in case of a patent fight. The box was opened in the presence of Bell relatives in 1937.

Sound was recovered from this recording in 2013.

Speaker: Alexander Melville Bell

Content (20 seconds): “[trilled r sounds] There are more things in heaven and

Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in our philosophy [trilled r sound].

I am a graphophone, and my mother was a phonograph.”

References:

Leslie J. Newville, “Development of the Phonograph at Alexander Graham Bell's Volta Laboratory,” in Contributions from the Museum of History and Technology, United States National Museum Bulletin 218, Paper 5 (1959): 69-79.

Patrick Feaster, “A Discography of Volta Laboratory Recordings at the National Museum of American History”

date made

1881-09

ID Number

ME.312123

catalog number

312123

accession number

162298

Data Source

National Museum of American History

The New Yost Patent Model

Description

The New Yost was introduced around 1889 and was produced by the Yost Writing Machine Company of New York, New York. This object served as a model for patent number 400,200 granted to Jacob Febel and Andrew W. Steiger on March 26th, 1889. The patent applied to a pivoted link in the type-bar that allowed for the type-bar to swing out horizontally and then rise up vertically to strike the platen. The model is missing the carriage it would need to be a fully functioning New Yost.

Location

Currently not on view

date made

1889

patent date

1889-03-26

inventor

Felbel, Jacob

Steiger, Andrew W.

ID Number

ME.308636

catalog number

308636

patent number

400200

400,200

accession number

89797

Data Source

National Museum of American History

Typewriter Ink Ribbon Mechanism Patent Model

Description

This model was submitted with patent number 286,161 by A. H. P. Stuart Wortley of London, England that was granted October 2, 1883. The patent applied to an improvement in the ink ribbon spool shaft of typewriters that was meant to reduce the sagging of the ribbon.

Location

Currently not on view

date made

1883

patent date

1883-10-02

inventor

Wortley, A. H. P. Stuart

ID Number

ME.318159

catalog number

318159

patent number

286,161

accession number

254082

patent number

286,161

Data Source

National Museum of American History

George W. N. Yost Typewriter Patent Model

Description

This typewriter patent model was used by George W.N. Yost in his patent application that received patent number 401,990 on April 23rd 1889. The patent covered a variety of improvements in typewriting machines, including allowing a user to supply an omission or make a correction in the printing, and an indicator for to alert the typist when they were reaching the end of a line.

Location

Currently not on view

date made

1889

patent date

1889-04-23

inventor

Yost, George W. N.

ID Number

ME.308637

catalog number

308637

patent number

401,990

401,990

accession number

89797

Data Source

National Museum of American History

George W. N. Yost Typewriter Patent Model

Description

This typewriter patent model accompanied George W.N. Yost’s patent application that received patent number 313,973 on March 17, 1885. The patent covered a variety of improvements to typewriters, including a platen and carriage adapted for regulating line and letter spacing, and a bell ringing on the carriage return.

Location

Currently not on view

date made

1885

patent date

1885-03-17

inventor

Yost, George W. N.

ID Number

ME.308633

catalog number

308633

patent number

313,973

313,973

accession number

89797

Data Source

National Museum of American History

Lucien S. Crandall Typewriter Patent Model

Description

Lucien Stephen Crandall of New York, New York received patent number 251,338 on December 20th, 1881 for this type-writing machine patent model design. Crandall described his invention as a “design to furnish a typewriting machine of simple and cheaper construction and with a greater range of type, combining upper and lower case letters, figures, and punctuation marks, and working them all with one set of keys merely.” The design had two interesting elements, the first being what Crandall called a “type-sleeve,” which allowed the printing of both lower-case and capital letters. The type-sleeve was covered with raised characters that wrapped around the sleeve arranged so that the most frequently used letters are in the center of the row requiring less shifting of the sleeve. The capital letters and numerals were not activated by a shift key, but rather a laterally-oscillating key-lever (the gold switch on the upper left of the model) that moved the type-sleeve. You would move the switch one way to activate the numerals and punctuation, and the other way to activate the capital letters. The keyboard for Crandall’s machine was arranged in a non-QWERTY fashion.

Lucien S. Crandall held several other patents for typewriters and typewriter improvements. The Crandall Machine Company of Groton, New York was founded in 1879 to produce Crandall’s machine. The first Crandall typewriter was manufactured in 1881, which was said to look very similar to the patent model displayed in object ME*251217. The New Model Crandall was marketed in 1885, and has the reputation of being one of the most beautiful early typewriters ever produced with inlaid mother of pearl in the casing, decorative flower motifs, and its elegant black keyboard (notably two rows and non-QWERTY). Crandall produced two more models, the Universal No. 3 in 1893, and the Improved Crandall in 1895. The company ceased operation by 1899.

Location

Currently not on view

patent date

1881-12-20

maker

Crandall, Lucien S.

ID Number

ME.251217

catalog number

251217

accession number

48865

patent number

251338

Data Source

National Museum of American History