[78-L] inner sleeves on LPs

[David Lennick]

We began collecting LPs in 1950 and were on the promo lists for a few record 
companies by 1954. Seems to me that inner sleeves began to become standard at 
that point, but in varying degrees. Capitol had them for ten-inch, I'm sure RCA 
didn't, nor Columbia and Decca (probably never did for ten-inch..at least in 
Canada). London gave you a paper sleeve AND an outer plastic sleeve which you 
could use as an inner sleeve, and an oversized jacket that allowed room for the 
extra thickness (and which is still too high for the average record shelf). 
Angel always had inner sleeves, no? Was Angel also the first to offer "factory 
sealed" albums?

Box sets had inner sleeves much earlier than single LPs. Columbia and Decca 
used albums (like the old 78 ones), as did the labels they custom pressed like 
Urania..seems to me RCA went immediately to box sets in 1950. By the mid 50s 
Columbia and Decca were putting their album sets in sleeves, inside albums, 
inside slipcases.

In general, "about 1954" seems to be the time for inner sleeves to become 
widespread..most of the ones I see which appear to be original (the Decca 
rounded plastic sleeve, the RCA with lists of New Orthophonic albums, the 
Capitol ones with the pretty girl showing you how to insert it [so to speak] 
and the various Columbia designs) seem to date from this point.

dl

Randy Watts wrote:
> When did record companies begin using inner sleeves with LPs? I don't think I've ever seen a 10-inch LP with a paper (or plastic) inner sleeve that wasn't a replacement. 
> 
> Randy
> 
>