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February 1889
The New Talking Machines
by Philip G. Hubert
The first idea of a
genuine talking-machine appears to belong to Thomas A. Edison, who, in 1875,
took out patents upon a device intended to reproduce complex sounds, such as
those of the human voice. Of the thousands of persons who in that year visited
the small room in the Tribune
building, in New York, where the first phonograph was for months on exhibition,
very few were found to hope much for the invention. It was apparently a toy of
no practical value; its talking was more or less of a caricature upon the human
voice, and only when one knew what had been said to the phonograph could its version be understood.
Edison's early phonograph nevertheless contained every essential feature of the
new instruments which he and other inventors are about to introduce. It was
founded upon the discovery that if a delicate diaphragm or sounding-board is
provided with a sharp point of steel, its vibrations under the sound of the
human voice will cause the sharp
point or stylus to make a series of impressions or indentations upon a sheet of
wax or other material passed beneath it. Such indentations, though microscopic,
are sufficiently defined to cause similar vibrations in the diaphragm, if the
stylus is again passed over the furrow of indentations, and this reproduction
is loud enough to be heard.
Thus the phonograph in its rudest form consists of
a little sounding-board, carrying on its under side a needle-point, and a sheet
of wax so held as just to touch the needle. The sound waves of the voice cause
the sounding-board with its needle-point to vibrate with a rapidity varying
with the pitch of the note. If the wax sheet is
moved slowly along while talk
is going on, the result is a line of minute indentations. So far there is
nothing surprising about the apparatus. But at the end of a line across the wax
sheet raise the diaphragm, and put it back to the beginning of the line,
causing the point
to travel again over the same
line of indentations. Listen carefully, and a repetition of the original sounds
spoken or sung into the apparatus will be heard, strong or weak, distinct or
indistinct, according to the perfection of the instrument. Tin-foil sheets were
first used
to receive the impression; they
were placed on a cylinder, which was turned
slowly by hand, in front of the
vibrating diaphragm. While the cylinder carrying the foil had a rotary motion,
it also moved from right to left, so that the line of dots or indentations made
by the stylus formed a spiral running around the cylinder.
The defects of the early
phonograph were so great that Edison found it impossible to interest
capitalists in perfecting it. It reproduced singing and whistling with
wonderful accuracy, but as a talker it was merely a curiosity. As such it was
exhibited throughout the country, and the few hundreds then made soon found
their way into college laboratories and museums. Edison went to work at his
electric light. At the same time there were not wanting eminent men in Europe
who predicted great things for the phonograph of the future.
What it
accomplished was so wonderful
that inventors would certainly
be tempted to work over it. The perfect and practical phonograph might be due
to a dozen men, each of whom should contribute something. One day it would be
found a useful and most wonderful, help to man. Edison himself has always
stoutly maintained this view. More than a score of times, during the last ten
years, he has said to me, ÒI wish I had leisure to work at my phonograph. When
I get rich I will astonish the world with it.Ó He tells me that whenever
disheartened for the moment over difficulties connected with his electric-light
system, his mind would revert to the phonograph. For years he kept a special
note-book in his pocket in which to jot down ideas concerning the invention,
suggestions as to future experiments, etc. Two years ago he found himself in a
position to take it up again.
In the mean time several other inventors
and workers had done something to
simplify the problem. Mr. Graham Bell, of telephone fame, has made phonographs
of far greater delicacy than any of the original instruments,
while in England some noted
experimenters have succeeded in doing wonders in the way of delicate apparatus.
Mr. Edison took up the work where these had left off. In place of a sheet of
tin-foil a sheet of prepared wax was adopted. The steel needle-point was
retained for indenting the sheet, but for reproducing the sound it was found
that an elastic splinter of bamboo, as fine as a hair, answered the purpose
better, and made so little impression upon the wax as not to wear off its
record. In place of a hand-crank to turn the cylinder an electric motor was
introduced. Finally all parts of the machine were made with a delicacy
and care not thought of ten
years ago. In the old phonograph the attempt was to make a loud noise, and this
was accomplished at the expense of distinctness of articulation. If the voice
of the perfected phonograph is as loud as that of a telephone, the result will
be satisfactory, provided it is perfectly distinct.
Edison has devoted
nearly two years to the task of making the phonograph of commercial use. He
believes that be has succeeded. Whether or not the instrument shall enter into
every-day life, as the telephone has done, is a question for the future.
Certainly it is now a far greater wonder than it was in 1875, and it has
reached a point where it
cannot
again be dropped by the scientific world. Whether Mr. Edison, or Mr. Bell, or
some one else puts the final touches which will take the apparatus out of the
laboratory
and make it practical
for common use does not much matter. Some one will certainly do it. Those
persons who smile incredulously when it is said that the perfected phonograph
will do away with letter-writing, will read to us, will sing and play for us,
will give us
books, music, plays,
speeches, at almost no cost, and become a constant source of instruction and
amusement, must have forgotten the ridicule they heaped upon the rumor
that an American inventor
proposed to talk from New York to Chicago. The achievements of the phonograph
will at best be less wonderful than those of the telephone.
It has been my privilege
to follow pretty closely the evolution of the phonograph under Mr. Edison's
hands, and also to study the graphophone of Mr. Bell. A brief account of one
apparatus will answer for both, as they are identical in essentials. The new
phonograph takes up, with its table, about the space occupied by a
sewing-machine, and might at first be taken for one. Underneath the table is an
electric battery or a treadle,
according to the power used in moving the cylinder. The wax cylinders,
or phonograms, as they are called, are two inches in diameter, and vary in
length from one to ten inches, according to the amount of talking which is to
be engraved upon them. The smallest size is about that of a napkin ring, and
will be sufficient for an ordinary business letter of two or three hundred
words. The wax surface is highly polished; when it has been through the
apparatus, the marks or engraving upon it can be seen only with a glass.
When a
message is to be recorded, one of these phonograms is slipped over the
permanent steel cylinder, which is set in motion, and the diaphragm, carrying
its stylus on the under side, is lowered toward the wax surface until a slight
grating sound announces that it touches.
Then the talking may begin. It is not necessary to talk louder than in
an ordinary conversation, but distinct articulation is required. For
reproduction, the stylus is raised, and the ÒfollowerÓ or sounding-spring is
brought into contact with the wax. The amount of talking upon a cylinder
depends, of course, upon the speed of the talker; one page of this magazine
might easily be recorded upon a cylinder ten inches long. The exact value of
the reproduction, both in the phonograph and the graphophone, is still,
according to my own experience in a score of tests, something of a lottery.
With a phone at my ear, I have heard Mr. Edison's phonograph read off a page of
Nicholas Nickleby so clearly that not one word in twenty was lost; the
phonograph's voice was as distinct and as loud as
that of a telephone in good working order. At other times
the results have been anything but satisfactory. When the apparatus is in the
hands of experts, who can adjust a screw here and there, they are likely to be
surprisingly good. As to trusting its manipulation to the office boy or the
typewriter girl, that is out of the question for the present. It is far too
delicate an instrument. When it comes to music, the present achievements are
wonderful. The phonograph will reproduce any kind of music — singing, the
piano, violin, cornet, oboe, etc. — with a beauty of tone and accuracy
which will astonish the musician. It is possible, also, to magnify musical sounds
without distorting them, as often happens where speech is concerned. Thus, I
have repeatedly heard music given out by the phonograph so loudly as to be
heard one hundred feet away from the instrument. Should the phonograph never
reach greater perfection than its present stage, — something which, as I
have already said, seems scarcely credible, — it will be of the greatest
use to musicians.
If we admit that the
inventors or manufacturers of the phonograph can turn out in quantities
instruments as perfect as the best of the present experimental machines, and
make them so automatic in action and so easily adjusted that every one who uses
a sewing-machine, a typewriter, or a telephone can use the phonograph, we
concede at
once that a wonderful field is
before them. The phonograph itself cannot cost more than fifty dollars, and the
wax cylinders used upon them scarcely more than writing-paper. Once a cylinder
has been Òengraved,Ó or has had a message recorded upon it, it can be passed
through the phonograph any number of times, apparently without deterioration.
Mr. Edison has some phonograms, containing pages of Nicholas Nickleby, which
have been read out thousands of times by the phonograph, and no indications of
wear are audible.
Finally, bear in mind that having once obtained a good
phonogram, it can be
multiplied ad infinitum at
nominal cost, and what a wonderful prospect opens before us! The duplication of
a phonogram is as simple as it is perfect. The wax phonogram is placed in a
bath, and coated with nickel by electric deposition. When the nickel plate is
sufficiently thick, it is stripped off, giving an exact mould, a die
representing every minute indentation of the original wax. In order to make a
second or a thousandth wax facsimile, wax sheets can be pressed against the
nickel die. Edison estimates that novels of the length of Nicholas Nickleby
could be sold in phonogram shape for a few cents. A good reader would first
have to read the whole book to the phonograph, and the
multiplication of the resulting
phonograms would then be simply a matter of detail.
So also with music, —
songs, piano pieces, symphonies, operas. There seems to be no reason why a play
cannot be reproduced so as to give infinite pleasure. The length of the
phonograph's message is limited only by the size of the phonograms. Edison
estimates that Nicholas Nickleby can be transcribed upon six cylinders, six
inches in diameter by
twelve inches in length. But
some one will soon discover a method of recording the phonographic message upon
an endless roll, so that the man who cannot sleep at night will be able to have
the machine read to him hour after hour without the trouble of changing
cylinders.
As compared with the field of the telephone, that of the phonograph
is limitless. The telephone must always remain somewhat of an expensive luxury,
owing to the cost of maintaining wires, connecting stations, etc. The whole
expense of the phonograph will be the first cost. Even its motive power may be
supplied by weights or
other costless means. Imagine
what the phonograph will do for the man on the borders of civilization! It will
supply him with books in a far more welcome shape than print, for
they will read themselves; the mail
will bring him the latest play of London, or opera
of Vienna. If he cares for
political speeches, he can have the Congressional Record in the shape of
phonograms. It is even possible to imagine that many books and stories may not
see the light of print at all; they will go into the hands of their readers, or
hearers rather, as phonograms.
As a saving in the time
given up to writing, the phonograph promises to far outstrip the typewriter. The business man can dictate to the
phonograph as fast as be can talk, and the wax cylinder, enclosed in a suitable
box, can be sent off by mail to read out its message perhaps thousands of miles
away. Or else, as is now done in Mr. Edison's laboratory in Orange, IN. J., the
typewriter girl can print out upon paper what her employer has dictated to the
phonograph. For the reporter, the editor, and the author who can dictate, a
device has been adapted to the phonograph which causes it to stop its message
at every tenth word, and to continue only when a spring is touched. Thus, the
editor can dictate his article to the phonograph as he does now to his
stenographer, and when the printer at the case gets the resulting phonogram the
instrument will dictate to him in short sentences. If he cannot set up the
sentence at one hearing, it will repeat its ten words. If he is satisfied, it
reads out ten words more.
I really see no reason why the newspaper of the
future should not come to the subscriber in the shape of a phonogram. It would
have to begin, however, with a table of contents, in order that one might not
have to listen to a two hours' speech upon the tariff question in order to get
at ten lines of a musical notice. But think what a musical critic might be able
to do for his public! He might give them whole arias from an opera or movements
from a symphony, by way of proof or illustration. The very tones of an actor's
or singer's voice might be reproduced in the morning notice of last night's
important dramatic or musical event.
It has been remarked, by the way, that
business letters and orders by phonograph would not be so binding as when put
in black and white upon paper. A little wax cylinder covered with microscopic
dots would not be considered as good evidence in court. But if the speaker's
voice, inflection, accent, were so reproduced that witnesses could swear to the
personality, would it not suffice? How could there be any dispute over a man's
will, when the voice of the dead man was heard?
In music, as I have
already said, the value of the phonograph even in its
present condition is
indisputable. Musicians are divided, and probably always will be, as to the
manner in which certain famous symphonies ought to be conducted. The
metronome marks used by Beethoven are
but uncertain guides at best, while no written directions as to dynamic values,
expression, etc., are worth much. The phonograph will at
least make it possible for the
musician of the future to know exactly bow our composers wished their music
given, for it will repeat that music as played today, with every shade of
expression, with all its infinite changes of time. Moreover, the phonograph
will offer to the composer that long-sought instrument, an automatic recorder
of improvisation
upon the piano or
other instrument. In the far-off future, when our descendants wish to compare
our simple little Wagner operas with the complex productions of their own days,
requiring, perhaps, a dozen orchestras, playing in half a dozen different keys
at once, they will have an accurate phonographic record of our harmonic
simplicity.
At present but few of
the new phonographs have been finished, and those only for exhibition purposes.
When they will be offered for sale seems to be doubtful; probably within a few
months. Mr. Edison says that by the beginning of 1890 the phonograph will be
far less of a curiosity than the telephone is now, and that he could begin
selling the instruments at once if he were fully satisfied with them. There is
always something which needs improving. Just at present there is needed a
funnel for so magnifying the sound that if the instrument is placed in the
centre of a table all the persons sitting around can hear its reading or its
music. For the last year it has been the same story, — the phonographs
would be ready for sale next month. It was so a year ago, and it may be so a
year from now. But these many delays, which have made people rather skeptical
as to the doings of the phonograph, do not make wonders already achieved less
wonderful, or warrant any doubts as to the vast possibilities which the little
device contains.
Volume 63, No. 376, pp. 256–261
Read the full article here.
