About this objectEdison invented the phonograph in 1877 to record and play back sounds on wax cylinders. This model doubled playback time to four minutes. Stanley Lee sold them in Hitchin.
The donor, the well known Hitchin fugure Stanley Lee, spoke about this phonograph in the North Herts Gazette on 8 March 1973. The article reads "On the sideboard at Mr Lee's house is an old phonograph made about 1903 which he picked up by chance several years ago. The amazing thing is that with a little care he can still make it play and after a few minutes fiddling about with it a crackling man's voice wheezed out of the horn while I (the reporter) was there. He told me that he got it while still in business along Bancroft when the Hitchin Chamber of Commerce organised an "old and new" competition and he wanted to contrast to the modern grammaphone he was entering. One of his staff knew of a man in Baldock who had a phonograph complete with dozens of cylinders, the ancestors of modern records and with hardly any bother at all Mr. Lee managed to get old of it. This is one of his posessions he wants to make sure gets to the Hitchin Museum eventually, and at the moment he is trying to improve the sound quality on it".
MakerThomas Alva Edison
Maker RoleMaker
Date Made1901-1905
Period20th Century (1901-2000)
Place MadeUnited States of America, New Jersey, Essex, Orange
Inscription and MarksPrinted front Thomas A. Edison TRADE MARK GEM
