[78-L] The 1941 RCA player: it plays both sides Magic Brain

[Michael Biel]

Robert M. Bratcher Jr. wrote:
> On 12/18/2008 7:16:14 AM, William A. Brent (bbrent at pipeline.com) wrote:
>  > wasn't this the Magic Brain?
>  >
>
> I think so....
>
>   
YES it IS the "Magic Brain".  It is NOT any of the other 
Johnny-come-latelies like the Seeco of 1948 and the RockOla Rocket of 
1952.  Nor the insult of the Lirpa 1 April Fools Day article in Audio.  
Note that the article was from 1941 and is describing a machine which is 
much before these "common jukebox designs" as Malcolm put it. 

We have talked about the Magic Brain several times on this list because 
people have seen it illustrated on Victor and Bluebird sleeves.  It did 
die off rather quickly  -- the only one I have seen in person was lying 
on its side on the floor of the electronics warehouse in the Smithsonian 
American History museum many decades ago.  The reason why it died off 
was not because it was impractical, but because of its date of 
introduction.  All civilian electronic production ceased by March or 
April 1942, and not too many of these expensive changers and their even 
more expensive console sets had been sold by then. 

A lot of parts were shared with RCA's regular changer, such as the 
knife-blade supports and the slide-in replaceable crystal cartridge with 
a semi-permanent sapphire stylus.  The question about how the record was 
clamped is answered by saying it isn't!  There is only a label-sized 
turntable.  It relies on the weight of the record to keep it on that 
tiny turntable.

You can see it in operation at  
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RHIAa_J0Rqc

It is rather shocking to see it drop the record.  It would have made 
more sense for the turntable to go up to the record like in a Wurlitzer 
jukebox, but this guy says it won't break records during the drop.

As I mentioned, there are pictures of it on many Victor and Bluebird 
sleeves of the day, but also here  http://www.shellac.org/wams/wmbrain.html

Mike Biel  mbiel at mbiel.com
>  > At 09:59 AM 12/18/2008, you wrote:
>  > >Did this model die off because it was impractical, rather than just too
>  > >expensive?  Did it ever have a name?  Sorry, I can't
>  > find a picture of it.
>  > >
>  > >from http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,765910,00.html
>  > >
>  > >(c)Time magazine
>  >=
>