American Record Co. Blue Disc Harlan & Stanley "Dixie"
$
25
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Description
Condition is V+. American Record Company disc number 031030. Harlan & Stanley sing "Dixie".
"Ellsworth Hawthorne and Horace Sheble were phonograph distributors in Philadelphia who were blacklisted by Edison for shady business practices. Their third partner was John Prescott, whose brother Frederick was a principal of the International Talking Machine Company (Zon-O-Phone), which in 1901 had been barred from producing records in contravention of Victor/Columbia’s crucial patents. As a subsidiary, the American Record Company began issuing lateral-cut discs in 1904. After Columbia won a decisive court case against Zon-O-Phone in 1906, the American Record Company was forced to cease operations."
Also - "This was a product of the American Record Co, of Springfield, Mass. (no relation to the much later American Record Corporation, which eventually controlled Brunswick, Columbia, and a rash of dime-store brands). Ellsworth A. Hawthorne & Horace Sheble were former Edison dealers who were blacklisted by Edison before 1900. John Hawthorne was the brother of Frederick M. Prescott, who was involved in creation of the Odeon Company in Europe. The company began operations in 1904, producing excellent-quality discs in violation of the basic Berliner and Jones patents on lateral disc recording. The company produced 7", 10", and 10-3/4" pressings at various times and even dabbled in double-sided pressings.
Much of its business came from supplying department-store and mail-order labels. The company suspended operations in 1907 after losing a patent infringment suit brought by Columbia, and some of their masters were shipped to England, where they were re-pressed an re-issued under the American Odeon Record label. The labels are virtually identical to the American version, except that a small Odeon trademark was added (the Indian remained intact). Hawthorne & Sheble remained in business, producing Star records and phonographs (no relation to the later Starr Piano Co. products) in violation of patents until their business was taken over by Columbia, around 1909. Prescott tried unsuccesffuly to launch his own double-sided Champion Two-For-One label in 1908.
Some of the client labels that American supplied included Busy Bee, Kalamazoo, and Peerless. In Europe, the records were reissued under the Leader and Pelican labels, among others. The blue pressing material was called "Empedite" and was supposedly superior to ordinary shellac. In reality, it appears to be a normal shellac-based compound simply dyed blue instead of black, and it wore just as quickly (if not more so) than regular black pressings. The last pressing under this label were in ordinary black shellac and show New York, rather than Springfield as their location."
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