[78-L] Dec 6, 2:30pm: “Restoring the 1878 St. Louis Edison Tinfoil Recording”

[Fabris, Gerald]

Thomas Edison National Historical Park - News Release
For Release: November 27, 2013
Contact: Karen Sloat-Olsen
Phone: 973-736-0550 x17

Special program by miSci Curator Chris Hunter:
“Restoring the 1878 St. Louis Edison Tinfoil Recording”
Friday, December 6th, 2013 at 2:30 pm

WEST ORANGE, NJ – On Friday, December 6th, 2013 at 2:30 pm, Thomas Edison
National Historical Park welcomes Chris Hunter, Curator of “miSci” Museum
of Innovation & Science, who will give a one-hour presentation titled
“Restoring the 1878 St. Louis Edison Tinfoil Recording.”

Last summer, miSci of Schenectady, New York announced that physicists at
the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory had recovered sound from one of
the oldest recordings in existence – a phonograph record made on tinfoil in
June 1878 in St. Louis, Missouri.  In this special presentation at Thomas
Edison National Historical Park, Hunter will describe the innovative
 scanning process used to restore the recording, and he will explain how
his archival research identified the talking and other sounds heard in the
recording.  The 1878 St. Louis Edison Tinfoil is the oldest recording of an
American’s voice that can be heard today.

The recording opens with a 23-second cornet solo of an unidentified song,
followed by a man's voice reciting "Mary Had a Little Lamb" and "Old Mother
Hubbard." The man laughs at two spots during the recording, including at
the end, when he recites the wrong words in the second nursery rhyme.
 Hunter determined that the man's voice on the tinfoil recording is
probably that of Thomas Mason, a St. Louis newspaper political writer who
also went by the pen name I.X. Peck.  Edison company records show that one
of the new tinfoil phonographs, serial No. 8, was sold to Mason for $95.50
in April 1878, and a search of old newspapers revealed a listing for a
public phonograph program offered by Peck on June 22, 1878 in St. Louis.

Thomas Edison invented the phonograph in December 1877.  It was the first
device that could both record and reproduce sound.  Only a very few
recordings from this very early period survive today. Those that survive
are delicate artifacts, effectively unplayable until recently.

The Thomas Edison National Historical Park Visitor Center is located at 211
Main Street. The Laboratory Complex is open Wednesday through Sunday, from
10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. year-round. The Glenmont Estate is open Fridays,
Saturdays and Sundays. All special programs are included with $7.00 park
entrance fee unless otherwise indicated. Children under 16 are free. Car
passes and tour tickets must be obtained at the Laboratory Complex Visitor
Center for all Glenmont programs. Reservations are required for some
programs. Visit our website at www.nps.gov/edis  or call 973-736-0550
extension 11 during visiting hours for more information.

-NPS-

Thomas Edison  National Historical Park
National Park Service
U.S. Department of the Interior
211 Main Street
West Orange, NJ 07052
973 736-0550 phone
973 736-6567 fax