[78-L] Record Stores

[Michael Biel]

Geoffrey Wheeler wrote:
> That’s a great project! I’ll be happy to help. Issues of The Record 
> Changer and Down Beat of the 1940s and ’50s carried store ads that show 
> their offerings, prices, etc. The HRS Society Rag also sent out 
> periodic auction lists in the 1930s which reveal the kind of stock they 
> were offering for sale and minimum bids.

Ineed to place these "specialty" within the universe of general record 
shops.  I have similar info on classical specialty shops of that same 
era.  It's the general shops that info can be found in phone books, 
general newspapers, etc. 

>  Store “stamps” on label 
> catalogs are another good source for store names. Obviously, if a store 
> carried label catalogs and rubber-stamped their names on them, they 
> carried the records. I even have a copy of Brunswick 2011 with a store 
> stamp carefully placed around the outside of the record label. This 
> record was released around January 15, 1920 among the first 15 released 
> by Brunswick in the “2000” numerical series.

I have seen an article noting that this is a service that was available 
by Brunswick to its dealers.  Whether its dealers were exclusive 
franchises or stores that could sell other labels and other things needs 
to be looked at.  Eventually we need to collect the addresses of all of 
these that different collectors have. 

>  I have record sleeves from 
> the 1920s from British record stores, as I’m sure other 78-Listers do. 
>   

Especially in England and Denmark these dealer sleeves are extra thick 
and are stitched up the sides.  Denmark has some with GREAT pictures, 
such as the ad for a sunlamp that shows a mother and her approx 12 year 
old son partaking of the sunlamp in the nude. 

> Schleman’s Rhythm on Record also contains print advertising for the 
> period. Concert programs may have store advertising. 

I have the reprint of RonR, and the program for BG's Carnegie Hall 
concert has an ad for Rabson's, which is the store that issued the Music 
Box label album of Lee Wiley sings Rodgers and Hart that we discussed a 
week or two ago.  It was diagonally across the street from Carnegie.  
But movie and show programs from small towns are even more valuable a 
source than those from the major cities.

> I have a newspaper 
> clipping about Benny Goodman visiting a record store in Ft. Wayne, 
> Indiana in 1939 while appearing at a local movie house for the weekly 
> Camel Caravan. He was there for about a half-hour visit to autograph 
> records (probably NOT Artie Shaw’s).

There are articles at the turn of the century about Cal Stewart visiting 
Edison dealers while touring and recording special records for them 
mentioning the store. 

>  Stores I visited in Boston while 
> growing up included Boston Music Co., Jack’s Records, Symphony Records 
> (part of the Boston Symphony Hall building), Book and Record Annex, and 
> several others whose names I have forgotten.

My personal memory of the NYC stores only starts in the mid-50s, that is 
why I value what Howard H is relating.  I just want the pictures to jog 
his memory.  When I came across photos of Sam Goody's 49th Street it 
brought back so many details to me that I had forgotten. 

>  Of course many department 
> and chain stores sold records. 
Obviously Sears, Monkey Wards, Kreske, Woolworth, and in NYC Macy's 
Herald Square was considered to have one of the best book and record 
departments in the city.

> My mother got Harry James to autograph a 
> copy of his Brunswick “Ciribiribin” at Raymond’s in Boston.

One of the other photos of Commodore that is in the DVD booklet shows 
Louis Armstrong autographing his autobiography in the early 50s.  I've 
seen newsreel footage of some autograph sessions in stores. 

>  Raymond’s also sold great macaroons.
>
>   
You got any autographed?

Mike Biel  mbiel at mbiel.com