Edison "Standard" cylinder phonograph with brass horn is one of Edison's first commercially sold models.

Although Edison's early attempts at recording sound employed tin foil as a recording medium, his company later acquired the use of wax cylinder recording which had originally been pioneered by Alexander Graham Bell.

Thomas Edison, despite being credited as one of the great inventors of the Industrial Age, was a ruthless man who was more interested in protecting his business interests than he was in advancing Science. His arch-rival, George Westinghouse, while a brilliant business man, was a more benevolent soul when it came to the marketing of his inventions. The great "rivalry of the currents" came as a result of Edison trying desperately to protect his electric light bulb, and the direct current generation system that he had pioneered to power it.

When Edison developed his carbon filament lamps, he settled on a system of power generation using direct current. As his system expanded across New York, Edison found that large drops in voltage were the norm, so in order to power a large area, numerous DC generating plants were needed. There was no way to step up and transmit DC current for long distances with transformers, as is the case with alternating current, because an inductive device such as a transformer, is a direct electrical short to DC current.

Meanwhile, Nicola Tesla, a Russian Physicist, had discovered that by generating current which continually changed polarity, that transformers could be applied to step up the generated voltage so that it could be transmitted long distances. Electrical pioneer George Westinghouse realized the value of Tesla's discovery, and he teamed up with Tesla to pioneer a system of alternating current transmission using generators and transformers which his Westinghouse Electric Company produced.

Edison, who now was facing a threat of not only Westinghouse-Tesla's superior transmission system, but also Westinghouse's developments which circumvented Edison's light bulb patent, became desperate. He undertook a marketing campaign to smear the Westinghouse name by declaring that Westinghouse's alternating current was dangerous. The campaign first involved movies, using Edison's motion picture camera invention to document the deliberate electrocution of dogs, horses and other animals using current from a Westinghouse generator. The most famous of these was the electrocution of Topsy, a rogue elephant who had been responsible for the death of several of his keepers. Finally, Edison was able to convince New York State to utilize Westinghouse's alternating current electricity in place of hanging for the execution of Capital criminals. The first execution by electricity was a grim and botched effort wherein the prisoner suffered great pain before being successfully executed. Edison coined the term "Westinghousing" of the prisoner in order to cast further shame on his business rival.

Despite all efforts by Edison, the Tesla-Westinghouse system of power generation was superior to Edison's, and it eventually became the standard for electric utilities around the world. On the other hand, Edison's electric chair was used almost universally as a method of Capital punishment in the United States throughout most of the 20th Century.

An Edison Amberol cylinder phono with internal sound horn.

This model was considered an improvement on the external horn phonographs, and the design set the stage for most mechanical phonographs built through the 1940s. The last all mechanical phonographs manufactured in the United States were made in the late 1940s and were predominantly intended to be children's toys.

The "Victor Talking Machine" above closely resembles an early 1900s model Berliner machine. Antique experts viewing this will probably recognize it as a well-done modern day fake that was made by a company in India. We are showing it as a warning to collectors that some really authentic looking but fake phonographs and radios are being made overseas and sold in America. Labels attached to these machines are often exact copies made from the original manufacturers' printing dies, which makes them even harder to identify.

Likewise, the photo below shows two very similar radios. The one on the left is an authentic 1939 Zenith model 6D-312 which was a very popular radio in its day, and highly sought by collectors. The one on the right is a transistorized modern day fake that was manufactured in the late 1990s, and has little or no value. To an inexperienced purchaser, the radio on the right could be easily mistaken for the real thing. Original Zenith 6D-312 sets are sought after, and examples have recently sold for well over $500 in EBAY auctions, so an unsuspecting collector could get easily burned if they don't know the distinguishing features of the antique.

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