Bulletin Article - May 2006

THE VICTOR TALKING MACHINE COMPANY

by Betty Lyons

In 1887, the American Gramophone Company of Chicago was the leading producer of phonographs and phonographic recordings.  In 190 I, Eldridge R Johnson of Moorestown, who owned a small manufacturing shop in Camden specializing in cylinders, incorporated a company he created after he had purchased the Gramophone Company from Emile Berliner. That company specialized in disc records.

The new combination was called The Victor Company because both men had won legal victories. Victor had won the right to trade in Latin America and the United States and Gramophone had the right to the trademark "His Master's Voice" as well as to the British market. The combined company existed from 1906 to 1929.

Their unique trademark soon became known the world over.  It was that of a dog which was born in Bristol, England in 1884. This fox terrier became known as Nipper because he nipped at people's legs.  His original owner was Mark Barraud, an up and coming artist who died in 1887.  His brother, Francis, also a painter, adopted the dog and took him to Liverpool.  He enjoyed the dog, and was fascinated, as was the dog, in the voice coming out of the horn on a Victrola phonograph. Unfortunately, Nipper died in 1888, but several years later Francis still remembered the dog looking at the phonograph and painted his picture.

On February 11, 1888, Francis entered the painting in a contest and called it "Dog Looking At and Listening To a Phonograph."  The horn was black and when the judges turned down the painting, one suggested that he make the horn gold. Francis went to the Gramophone Company on Madison Avenue in London and asked to borrow a golden horn so that he could repaint that part of the picture. They gave him one, he painted out the cylinder which was a general phonograph and repainted the picture with a disc which was The Victor Company product. He also renamed the picture "His Master's Voice." When Mr Berliner, the original owner of the Gramophone Company sailed from England to America, he brought the trademark with him. The Gramophone Company and the Victor Company had merged and had the unusual trademark Francis Barraud was requested by the Company to paint 24 more pictures and did so before his death on August 29, 1924. Along the way, the name had been lengthened to The Victor Talking Machine Company.

The company became quite famous. The statue of Nipper was placed on the manufacturing buildings in Camden and later was sent to the Smithsonian Institute.

Eldridge Johnson decided that he should make a special product and promoted Red Seal records as opposed to the usual Black Seal and occasional Gold Seal records. These were special artists who were extremely popular, the best singers and musicians of their day. Mr Johnson felt that if he brought in the best people to record music, even if the company lost money on some of the musicians because of their demand for large payments, people would buy their products rather than rival companies. One of the products, The Victor Talking Machine Victrola, was built in a nice cabinet which eventually eliminated

having the awkward horn.

Many employees of the company lived in Haddonfield.  My father was one of them. The company paid for the artists to stay in the Walt Whitman Hotel in Camden, all expenses paid, while they spent the day in the recording studio. My father worked with the artists and often brought them home for dinner. For some reason, I especially remember Nick Lucas, a pioneer in guitar music. I think I was about 4 years old, had no idea how famous he was, but I remember he brought his instrument to practice for the next day's recording. He popularized "Tiptoe Thru' the Tulips With Me," long before another man associated through marriage to Haddonfield, the singer Tiny Tim, did.

Although people had cars, many workers took the trolley to work in Camden. That trolley started on Kings Highway where the high speed line tracks are now and went down the Highway, turning onto Haddon Avenue where it made its way to Camden. It reversed direction on Kings Highway where the local residents used to watch as the conductor headed the trolley in the other direction.

The Victor Talking Machine Company continued its Camden operations until it was sold in 1929 for $154 million to Radio Corporation of America. They changed its name to RCA Victor and kept the trademark of Nipper the dog. Unfortunately, during the Great Depression, sales of the company dropped considerably since its products were made for pleasure. However, it was then that construction was begun on "the huge city within a city" which we now know as Rockefeller Center. Important parts of the Center included Radio City, the headquarters for RCA and the network studios of NBC. It would be the beginning of the great age of radio.