WEBVTT - The Birth of the Turntable 0:00:04.160 --> 0:00:07.160 Get in tech with technology with tech Stuff from how 0:00:07.240 --> 0:00:13.840 stuff works dot com. Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. 0:00:13.880 --> 0:00:19.079 I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm a producer host a 0:00:19.200 --> 0:00:22.159 gad about town here at how Stuff Works, and I 0:00:22.239 --> 0:00:26.599 love all things tech and we're going to continue our 0:00:26.760 --> 0:00:33.440 series of listener requests about tech that relates back to music. Today, 0:00:33.800 --> 0:00:38.080 I'm talking about a request from listener Gelert. Gellert wrote 0:00:38.080 --> 0:00:41.080 in to ask that I do an episode about DJ technology. 0:00:41.800 --> 0:00:45.600 Here's the thing, there's a ton to cover in DJ tech, 0:00:46.200 --> 0:00:49.479 and I could have just done one sort of overview episode, 0:00:49.520 --> 0:00:51.879 but I don't feel like that's really the spirit of 0:00:51.920 --> 0:00:54.520 this show, and I don't think it just I don't 0:00:54.520 --> 0:00:56.840 think it will do justice to Gellert's request, and I 0:00:56.880 --> 0:01:00.320 don't think it really serves you guys well as lessners. 0:01:00.400 --> 0:01:03.800 So instead, I'm gonna take my time and for this 0:01:03.840 --> 0:01:07.880 particular episode, I'm going to focus on the origin of 0:01:08.080 --> 0:01:11.319 one piece of technology used in DJ work, and that 0:01:11.360 --> 0:01:15.400 would be the predecessor of the turntable. That's right, I'm 0:01:15.440 --> 0:01:18.400 not even really talking about the turntable in this episode because, 0:01:18.840 --> 0:01:22.280 as it turns out, no pun intended. I'm probably gonna 0:01:22.280 --> 0:01:25.360 be saying turn a lot this episode, but trust me, 0:01:25.400 --> 0:01:27.640 I'm not intending it to be kind of a pun. 0:01:28.240 --> 0:01:30.960 But as it turns out, it's a very long and 0:01:31.120 --> 0:01:35.440 rich history, and it's really interesting well before it ever 0:01:35.480 --> 0:01:38.120 becomes what we would typically call a turntable or a 0:01:38.120 --> 0:01:40.960 record player. So this is part one, and in part 0:01:41.000 --> 0:01:43.959 two we will continue that story before moving on to 0:01:44.440 --> 0:01:47.680 other listener requests that also have to do with music. 0:01:48.320 --> 0:01:51.920 So a few years ago, I probably would have made 0:01:51.920 --> 0:01:53.640 a joke, In fact, I know I would have made 0:01:53.640 --> 0:01:56.080 the joke that most of you guys out there have 0:01:56.200 --> 0:01:59.800 no idea what a turntable is because vinyl had gone 0:01:59.800 --> 0:02:02.280 out of favor after a while, and really the only 0:02:02.280 --> 0:02:05.840 people who were interested in vinyl were collectors and DJ's 0:02:06.160 --> 0:02:09.520 and everyone else had kind of lost any connection to it. 0:02:09.600 --> 0:02:13.600 But since then, vinyl has obviously experienced a renaissance. You've 0:02:13.639 --> 0:02:16.920 got a lot more bands that are producing albums in vinyl, 0:02:17.320 --> 0:02:19.600 You've got a lot more companies out there making equipment 0:02:19.600 --> 0:02:21.960 to play vinyl. You've got a lot more people out 0:02:21.960 --> 0:02:26.440 there interested in buying it. So heck, the Facebook friendship 0:02:26.520 --> 0:02:29.840 anniversary videos that you get whenever it's your anniversary of 0:02:29.919 --> 0:02:33.239 making friends with someone on Facebook that features a vinyl 0:02:33.320 --> 0:02:36.079 album being placed on a turntable, so the references are 0:02:36.080 --> 0:02:39.520 out there. So I'm gonna assume y'all know what a 0:02:39.520 --> 0:02:42.160 turntable is. Now. In my neck of the woods, we 0:02:42.560 --> 0:02:45.240 sometimes would call these record players, but you should know 0:02:45.560 --> 0:02:49.519 record players and turntables are technically two different types of technology. 0:02:49.560 --> 0:02:53.000 They're very similar. A record player has a turntable incorporated 0:02:53.040 --> 0:02:57.520 into it, but you shouldn't just use the terms interchangeably, 0:02:57.919 --> 0:03:01.280 like I am probably going to you, because old habits 0:03:01.320 --> 0:03:05.560 die hard, y'all. So this is a really big story, 0:03:05.800 --> 0:03:08.000 and like I said, this is part one of the 0:03:08.040 --> 0:03:10.720 history of turntables and how they work. In our next episode, 0:03:11.000 --> 0:03:13.880 we'll pick up where we left off today and uh 0:03:13.880 --> 0:03:17.480 spoiler alert, that'll be just before World War Two, but 0:03:17.800 --> 0:03:21.040 we're gonna go from its origins up to that point today, 0:03:21.160 --> 0:03:25.360 and then maybe we'll start chatting in the next episode 0:03:25.360 --> 0:03:28.000 about some of the features you'll find on modern turntable, 0:03:28.080 --> 0:03:30.800 specifically the ones that professional d j z is because 0:03:31.120 --> 0:03:34.960 they've got some metaphorical bells and whistles that you won't 0:03:35.000 --> 0:03:37.720 find on your typical record player at home. Now, I 0:03:37.760 --> 0:03:40.200 feel like I've talked a lot about the physics of 0:03:40.320 --> 0:03:44.160 sound over the past few episodes, so I'm just gonna 0:03:44.240 --> 0:03:46.600 hit the high points so that we have that foundation. 0:03:46.920 --> 0:03:51.240 Sound is vibration, and we primarily hear sounds through these 0:03:51.320 --> 0:03:55.840 vibrations affecting the tympanic membrane in our ears, which transfers 0:03:55.880 --> 0:04:00.760 those vibrations to structures called cochlea inside our inner ear, 0:04:01.000 --> 0:04:05.040 And inside the cochlea there's fluid that when it moves 0:04:05.800 --> 0:04:09.600 due to these vibrations, it stimulates special nerve cells that 0:04:09.640 --> 0:04:13.480 then send impulses to the brain, which interprets all of 0:04:13.520 --> 0:04:16.760 that as sound. I think that's the most important bits 0:04:16.800 --> 0:04:19.680 that I could hit. But remembering that sound is a 0:04:19.760 --> 0:04:24.159 physical phenomena, it is vibration, that's the important part. When 0:04:24.160 --> 0:04:28.560 it comes to the history of turntables and recorded sound. Now, 0:04:28.600 --> 0:04:31.520 the idea of a device that could play back sound 0:04:31.760 --> 0:04:35.560 dates back much further than our ability to achieve such 0:04:35.560 --> 0:04:38.159 a goal. This what came as a big surprise to me. 0:04:38.680 --> 0:04:44.000 So there was a great French novelist, seven Yen de 0:04:44.200 --> 0:04:48.960 Siernald de Bejarac, who lived during the seventeen century. He 0:04:49.040 --> 0:04:53.960 actually wrote about such a potential gadget not in a 0:04:54.040 --> 0:04:58.080 way of or not as a means of making one like. 0:04:58.080 --> 0:05:00.080 It wasn't a set of instructions, but rather just a 0:05:00.200 --> 0:05:03.360 concept he had. And this is, by the way, the 0:05:03.400 --> 0:05:07.400 person whom the play sierra No de Bergerac was based 0:05:07.480 --> 0:05:11.000 upon it was a real person, and he actually did 0:05:11.400 --> 0:05:13.760 have quite the shnaws on him. If you know the 0:05:13.760 --> 0:05:17.720 story of Sierrano de Bergerac, you know he was regarded 0:05:17.720 --> 0:05:20.880 as a man who was very gifted in language, a 0:05:20.920 --> 0:05:24.480 wonderful poet, but also, and not to mention, a deadly duelist, 0:05:24.520 --> 0:05:26.599 but also a guy who had a really big nose. 0:05:27.000 --> 0:05:30.159 As it turns out, the real Sierrano de Bergerac was 0:05:30.200 --> 0:05:32.599 all those things, but most of the other elements in 0:05:32.640 --> 0:05:37.360 the famous play based off of his life are largely invented. Anyway, 0:05:37.760 --> 0:05:42.680 sierra No wrote the following about a device he discovered. 0:05:42.880 --> 0:05:46.360 Let's say, in a dream. He was dreaming about the 0:05:46.400 --> 0:05:50.919 moon and possible inhabitants of the moon, and he in 0:05:51.040 --> 0:05:54.560 this dream he encounters a box, and he says, when 0:05:54.560 --> 0:05:58.240 I opened a box, I found something made of metal 0:05:58.640 --> 0:06:02.080 somewhat like our locks, full of an endless number of 0:06:02.160 --> 0:06:06.520 little springs and tiny machines. It was indeed a book, 0:06:06.760 --> 0:06:09.240 but it was a miraculous one that had no pages 0:06:09.360 --> 0:06:11.760 or printed letters. It was a book to be read 0:06:11.880 --> 0:06:15.440 not with the eyes, but with ears. When anyone wants 0:06:15.480 --> 0:06:17.880 to read, he winds up the machine with a large 0:06:17.960 --> 0:06:20.640 number of keys of all kinds. Then he turns the 0:06:20.680 --> 0:06:23.599 indicator to the chapter he wants to listen to. As 0:06:23.640 --> 0:06:26.600 though from the mouth of a person or a musical instrument, 0:06:26.720 --> 0:06:30.159 come all the distinct and different sounds that the upper 0:06:30.240 --> 0:06:33.840 class moon beings used in their language. When I thought 0:06:33.839 --> 0:06:36.680 about this marvelous way of making books, I was no 0:06:36.760 --> 0:06:39.400 longer surprised that the young people of that country know 0:06:39.560 --> 0:06:42.800 more at the age of sixteen or eighteen than the 0:06:42.839 --> 0:06:46.000 graybeards of our world. They can read as soon as 0:06:46.000 --> 0:06:48.400 they can talk, and are never at a loss for 0:06:48.480 --> 0:06:52.600 reading material. In their rooms, on walks in town, during 0:06:52.680 --> 0:06:56.440 voyages on foot, or on horseback, they can have thirty 0:06:56.480 --> 0:06:59.120 books in their pockets or hanging on the pommels of 0:06:59.160 --> 0:07:02.240 their saddles. They need only wind to spring to hear 0:07:02.320 --> 0:07:06.480 one or more chapters, or a whole book, if they wish. Thus, 0:07:06.520 --> 0:07:09.040 you always have with you all the great men, both 0:07:09.120 --> 0:07:14.040 living and dead, who speak to you in their own voices. Now, 0:07:14.080 --> 0:07:16.280 I think that's actually a remarkable dream when you think 0:07:16.280 --> 0:07:19.960 about it, because what Siatrano de Bergerac is describing in 0:07:20.000 --> 0:07:25.080 this fanciful description of a dream are are things that 0:07:25.120 --> 0:07:28.640 we have today. The idea of having a device that's 0:07:28.680 --> 0:07:32.240 able to play back for you and audio copy of 0:07:32.240 --> 0:07:34.440 a book. I mean, we have entire businesses that are 0:07:34.480 --> 0:07:38.680 built around making audio books available and then devices that 0:07:38.760 --> 0:07:43.120 can play those, and so sierr No's just being fanciful, 0:07:43.160 --> 0:07:46.000 but today we actually have that stuff. So this was 0:07:46.120 --> 0:07:50.040 kind of amazing science fiction from this uh, this French 0:07:50.160 --> 0:07:55.000 author back in hundreds of years ago. So it's a 0:07:55.080 --> 0:07:57.360 charming dream, but as I said, it was a little 0:07:57.400 --> 0:07:59.720 more than wishful thinking in sierr No's day. It would 0:07:59.760 --> 0:08:04.000 take two more centuries before someone attempted a practical means 0:08:04.040 --> 0:08:07.640 to convert sound into a recorded medium. And it was 0:08:07.680 --> 0:08:11.240 in a peculiar but a clever way. Before there was 0:08:11.320 --> 0:08:15.520 ever a phonograph or a grammophone, and certainly long before 0:08:15.560 --> 0:08:19.200 there were turntables or record players, there was the phone autograph. 0:08:19.640 --> 0:08:24.760 A nineteenth century French bookseller named Edward Leon Scott de 0:08:24.880 --> 0:08:28.040 Martinville came up with the idea or Martin Villa, if 0:08:28.040 --> 0:08:29.680 you prefer it, came up with this idea and it 0:08:29.720 --> 0:08:34.160 was a pretty cool one. In the eighteen fifties. Eddie, 0:08:34.280 --> 0:08:37.040 as I call him, was reflecting on the growing art 0:08:37.120 --> 0:08:41.120 and science of photography, which was a very young technology 0:08:41.240 --> 0:08:44.640 at that time. Photographs were able to capture moments in 0:08:44.720 --> 0:08:48.640 still images, but what if you could capture sound in 0:08:48.679 --> 0:08:52.960 a similar way and make a record of actual audible stimuli. 0:08:53.480 --> 0:08:56.440 Scott created a design for a machine that would do 0:08:56.520 --> 0:08:59.400 just that. It did not record sound directly to a 0:08:59.440 --> 0:09:03.800 medium exactly, but rather made a record of sound upon 0:09:03.880 --> 0:09:08.360 a visual format. He proposed mounting an acoustic trumpet over 0:09:08.440 --> 0:09:11.720 a pane of glass that was coated in lamp black, 0:09:12.200 --> 0:09:14.200 so sort of like a kind of like an ink. 0:09:14.880 --> 0:09:18.040 The flared end of the trumpet would face the sounds 0:09:18.080 --> 0:09:20.720 you wish to document, so it's almost like the business 0:09:20.840 --> 0:09:24.240 end of a microphone. You would put the sound into 0:09:24.360 --> 0:09:27.080 that side of it. The small end of the trumpet 0:09:27.240 --> 0:09:31.480 had a very thin membrane stretched across it, so uh, 0:09:31.520 --> 0:09:33.520 if it were a classical trumpet, the part that you 0:09:33.520 --> 0:09:35.559 would blow in the mouthpiece that would have a little 0:09:35.600 --> 0:09:39.719 membrane on it. Mounted on the center of this membrane, 0:09:39.760 --> 0:09:42.480 facing away from the interior of the trumpet and toward 0:09:42.559 --> 0:09:45.600 the pane of glass, would be a small needle made 0:09:45.600 --> 0:09:49.000 from a flexible but stiff material such as boar's hair. 0:09:49.600 --> 0:09:54.200 This needle would make very light contact with that pane 0:09:54.200 --> 0:09:57.360 of glass, just enough so that if the needle would 0:09:57.400 --> 0:10:01.240 move due to vibrations in the membrane, it would disturb 0:10:01.440 --> 0:10:04.520 the lamp black. Vibrations in the membrane. Now, I feel 0:10:04.520 --> 0:10:08.160 like singing a song, but I'm not gonna Scott proposed 0:10:08.200 --> 0:10:11.560 moving the lamp black so that the needle would gently 0:10:11.640 --> 0:10:15.439 drag across it, and then speaking into the trumpet, you 0:10:15.480 --> 0:10:18.920 would create these vibrations and that would end up tracing 0:10:19.040 --> 0:10:22.720 patterns on the lamp black. You would smear the lamp 0:10:22.720 --> 0:10:26.040 black away and what would be left is a pattern 0:10:26.120 --> 0:10:29.000 that would represent whatever the sound was that went into 0:10:29.120 --> 0:10:32.760 the trumpet. So you would have a record of what 0:10:32.920 --> 0:10:36.480 happened just dragged in this lamp black. Now, he didn't 0:10:36.520 --> 0:10:39.120 intend for this device to have any useful ability to 0:10:39.200 --> 0:10:42.720 play back sound. Instead, he thought it would create a 0:10:42.800 --> 0:10:48.079 type of natural stenography that way of actually taking down dictation. 0:10:48.200 --> 0:10:51.000 For example, it would be a visual record of the 0:10:51.040 --> 0:10:54.720 noises that were present during the recording session, and perhaps 0:10:54.760 --> 0:10:57.480 one day, with enough study, we would be able to 0:10:57.559 --> 0:11:01.360 read the words that were spoken simply by looking at 0:11:01.360 --> 0:11:04.560 the patterns that had been left behind in the lampblack. So, 0:11:04.600 --> 0:11:07.559 in other words, you might say the same sound over 0:11:07.600 --> 0:11:10.439 and over and over again while you use this machine, 0:11:10.720 --> 0:11:13.400 you look for the pattern that's made from speaking that 0:11:13.520 --> 0:11:16.480 sound while the machine is in use, and then you say, 0:11:16.520 --> 0:11:19.920 all right, every time I see this particular shape in 0:11:20.679 --> 0:11:24.160 this kind of glass, I know that it was that 0:11:24.320 --> 0:11:26.760 sound that made this shape. That was kind of the 0:11:26.800 --> 0:11:29.240 basis of his idea. As it turns out, this wasn't 0:11:29.280 --> 0:11:32.320 that far fetched. In fact, it's now been done more 0:11:32.360 --> 0:11:35.320 than a century later. In two thousand and eight, historians 0:11:35.320 --> 0:11:38.960 were able to use optical imaging to scan phone autograph 0:11:39.120 --> 0:11:42.880 cylinders and play back the sound. There's a great example 0:11:42.920 --> 0:11:46.280 of one that recorded someone singing au Claire de la lune, 0:11:46.360 --> 0:11:50.199 a French folks song. The sound file the historians generated 0:11:50.280 --> 0:11:52.960 at first didn't sound anything like that. It didn't sound 0:11:53.040 --> 0:11:55.679 recognizable at all, at least not to me. But they 0:11:55.720 --> 0:11:58.800 built in some algorithms to clean stuff up, to adjust 0:11:58.880 --> 0:12:03.240 the playback speed, to remove some harmonics to enhance some 0:12:03.320 --> 0:12:05.640 other elements of it, and then once they were done, 0:12:05.679 --> 0:12:09.440 it was unmistakably au Claire de la Loon. By eighteen 0:12:09.480 --> 0:12:13.520 fifty nine, Scott partnered with a man named Rudolph Kinnig, 0:12:13.800 --> 0:12:18.040 who specialized in building precise instrumentation. He was a machinist. 0:12:18.520 --> 0:12:23.120 The two determined that one necessary requirement was a means 0:12:23.200 --> 0:12:26.439 to have an accurate and precise measurement of the passing 0:12:26.480 --> 0:12:29.160 of time in relation to the creation of a recording. 0:12:29.640 --> 0:12:32.720 By using a tuning fork of a known pitch, the 0:12:32.760 --> 0:12:35.559 two could determine the amount of time that passed during 0:12:35.600 --> 0:12:38.679 any part of a recording. A tuning fork will always 0:12:38.760 --> 0:12:42.560 vibrate at the same frequency. The specific frequency depends upon 0:12:42.600 --> 0:12:45.160 the tuning forks. So if you have a tuning fork 0:12:45.480 --> 0:12:48.920 with a fundamental frequency of the note A, it will 0:12:49.040 --> 0:12:51.840 vibrate at four hundred forty times per second or four 0:12:51.920 --> 0:12:55.440 hundred forty hurts. So if you have an a tuning 0:12:55.480 --> 0:12:58.480 fork and you strike it and then you put that 0:12:58.520 --> 0:13:01.959 next to one of these phonautographs as it's recording, you'll 0:13:02.040 --> 0:13:06.160 get this very even pattern that's made from the vibration 0:13:06.320 --> 0:13:09.600 of that needle. And if you count the repetition of 0:13:09.640 --> 0:13:13.320 that pattern, essentially the wave that you're seeing. You should 0:13:13.520 --> 0:13:17.520 be able to say, well, this this stretch represents one second, 0:13:17.559 --> 0:13:21.160 because there are four hundred and forty of those repeated 0:13:21.200 --> 0:13:24.640 patterns here, and we know that the tuning fork it 0:13:24.920 --> 0:13:27.640 vibrates at four forty times per seconds. So by counting 0:13:27.679 --> 0:13:29.640 those up and we get to four or forty, we say, 0:13:29.640 --> 0:13:32.840 all right, that represents one second of recording time. And 0:13:32.880 --> 0:13:36.559 according to the National Park Service website, Scott's original design 0:13:36.600 --> 0:13:40.079 would move the glass pane across the needle at a 0:13:40.160 --> 0:13:44.040 speed of about one meter per second, which is pretty 0:13:44.160 --> 0:13:48.040 darn fast. Now. The reason I mentioned Scott's work is 0:13:48.040 --> 0:13:50.839 to point out that many different people were thinking about 0:13:50.840 --> 0:13:53.640 ways to preserve sound, whether in a format that could 0:13:53.679 --> 0:13:56.880 be played back or some other method of notation, and 0:13:56.920 --> 0:13:59.320 a few looked at Scott's work and began to wonder 0:13:59.400 --> 0:14:02.480 if such a thing would be possible with the phonoten graph. 0:14:02.720 --> 0:14:07.720 One such smarty pants was Alexander Graham Bell, who theorized 0:14:07.760 --> 0:14:09.760 that if you could find a means to trace the 0:14:09.760 --> 0:14:14.479 patterns created by the phonotograph and transmit vibrations to a membrane, 0:14:14.840 --> 0:14:18.000 you could recreate the sound that originally was responsible for 0:14:18.040 --> 0:14:21.600 the markings. In other words, if you reverse this process 0:14:21.640 --> 0:14:25.520 where the patterns that are on the pane of glass 0:14:25.840 --> 0:14:30.119 can transfer vibrations back to a needle, back to a membrane, 0:14:30.600 --> 0:14:33.040 you should be able to replicate the sound that made 0:14:33.040 --> 0:14:36.200 those patterns in the first place. But he couldn't quite 0:14:36.240 --> 0:14:38.240 figure out how to do it, Plus he was kind 0:14:38.240 --> 0:14:42.040 of busy with other stuff, like inventing the telephone. In 0:14:42.160 --> 0:14:46.480 April eighteen seventy seven, a French poet named Charles Kroll 0:14:47.200 --> 0:14:51.000 suggested a method he thought might just work. And this 0:14:51.040 --> 0:14:54.080 is where I really marvel at how French poets were 0:14:54.120 --> 0:14:58.560 so forward thinking and inventive. Anyway, Miss r Krow said 0:14:58.600 --> 0:15:02.160 that if you could etch sound into a medium, such 0:15:02.160 --> 0:15:05.320 as a disc of tempered steel, you could create an 0:15:05.320 --> 0:15:09.000 apparatus that could use those etchings to recreate the original sound. 0:15:09.480 --> 0:15:13.760 He called his proposed invention a paleophone. He filed a 0:15:13.800 --> 0:15:16.320 paper on the subject with the French Academy of Science, 0:15:16.880 --> 0:15:21.480 wherein more or less was forgotten about for a few months. Meanwhile, 0:15:21.720 --> 0:15:24.200 another person was at work on this concept, and that 0:15:24.320 --> 0:15:28.760 was the Wizard of Menlo Park himself, Thomas Edison now 0:15:29.720 --> 0:15:32.440 a moment here. I think Edison gets an awful lot 0:15:32.440 --> 0:15:35.560 of credit for this field, and it is good to 0:15:35.560 --> 0:15:37.880 remind ourselves that he was not the only big thinker 0:15:37.920 --> 0:15:41.400 out there. It's also important to acknowledge that Edison employed 0:15:41.400 --> 0:15:44.680 a lot of people, and many of those people contributed 0:15:44.800 --> 0:15:48.440 in very meaningful ways to the things that he had invented. 0:15:49.000 --> 0:15:52.600 So we really should mention that a lot of Edison's 0:15:52.640 --> 0:15:55.640 inventions were truly collaborative efforts, at least when it got 0:15:55.640 --> 0:15:58.280 to the part of taking an idea and making it 0:15:58.360 --> 0:16:01.120 a real thing. Now, that's not to take away from Edison. 0:16:01.480 --> 0:16:04.560 He really was a remarkable innovator. He did come up 0:16:04.600 --> 0:16:07.960 with these amazing ideas. But we do need to also 0:16:08.000 --> 0:16:11.640 credit the other people who contributed, and they should get 0:16:11.680 --> 0:16:14.520 some props for their work well. According to the story, 0:16:15.080 --> 0:16:18.400 Edison first got the idea for what would become the 0:16:18.440 --> 0:16:22.920 phonograph by accident. He had been working on a completely 0:16:23.040 --> 0:16:27.280 different piece of technology that was designed to record incoming 0:16:27.280 --> 0:16:31.480 Morse code messages from a telegraph machine. So his invention 0:16:31.560 --> 0:16:36.520 consisted of paper that was wrapped around a rotating drum 0:16:36.560 --> 0:16:41.040 and a stylus connected to the incoming telegraph messages would 0:16:41.120 --> 0:16:44.200 move against the paper as the drum rotated, and it 0:16:44.200 --> 0:16:48.120 would make indentations that would indicate the dots and dashes 0:16:48.320 --> 0:16:52.040 from the Morse code. Edison told his buddy Edward H. 0:16:52.160 --> 0:16:55.760 Johnson about it, and how when Edison rotated the drum 0:16:55.840 --> 0:16:59.640 quickly and the stylists vibrated against those indentations that it 0:16:59.760 --> 0:17:04.119 may it would create this sort of humming noise. And 0:17:04.240 --> 0:17:07.560 Edison theorized that he could use a device like that 0:17:08.160 --> 0:17:11.320 if he fitted it with a diaphragm as opposed to 0:17:11.440 --> 0:17:14.240 having it connected to a telegraph machine, he might be 0:17:14.280 --> 0:17:16.919 able to record sound directly to a physical medium and 0:17:16.960 --> 0:17:20.000 play it back. The diaphragm would vibrate, the stylist would 0:17:20.000 --> 0:17:24.119 move against the paper drum, and then if you spun 0:17:24.160 --> 0:17:26.440 it again, like if you reset the needle at the top, 0:17:26.480 --> 0:17:28.720 and you spun the drum again, then it would cause 0:17:28.800 --> 0:17:33.200 that needle or that stylist to vibrate, transmit those vibrations 0:17:33.200 --> 0:17:35.720 to the membrane, and then you would have the sound again. 0:17:36.240 --> 0:17:39.240 Now he was doing this independently. He had not read 0:17:39.320 --> 0:17:43.200 of Crow's work, so this was not him copying someone else. 0:17:43.480 --> 0:17:47.000 He was just kind of theorizing to his buddy, and 0:17:47.560 --> 0:17:51.000 he thought that's a neat idea. Well, Edward Johnson thought 0:17:51.000 --> 0:17:53.360 it was way more than a neat idea. He actually 0:17:53.400 --> 0:17:57.880 went and wrote to the journal Scientific American UH, which 0:17:57.960 --> 0:18:00.879 published the letter that said Edison was working on a 0:18:01.000 --> 0:18:05.840 quote speaking telegraph in the quote device. Now this put 0:18:06.160 --> 0:18:09.000 a bunch of pressure on Edison. He was in a pickle. 0:18:09.240 --> 0:18:12.280 He needed to either get to work on actually inventing 0:18:12.359 --> 0:18:14.760 this thing he had sort of just been kind of 0:18:15.080 --> 0:18:19.639 hypothesizing about to his friend, or risk facing a public 0:18:19.680 --> 0:18:22.560 failure in in not doing so. So he began to 0:18:22.600 --> 0:18:25.680 work in Earnest on creating a gadget capable of recording 0:18:25.760 --> 0:18:30.159 sound to physical media. Edison created a design based on 0:18:30.240 --> 0:18:33.399 his ideas and then sent that design to a machinist 0:18:33.440 --> 0:18:37.439 in his employee named John Crucy. Crucy had worked for 0:18:37.480 --> 0:18:40.840 the Singer Sewing Machine Company before Edison hired him away, 0:18:41.160 --> 0:18:45.360 and he had impressed Edison with his astounding skill at 0:18:45.359 --> 0:18:50.200 fabricating machine parts that could bring to life Edison's ideas. 0:18:50.680 --> 0:18:54.320 The phonograph was no exception. With little more instruction from 0:18:54.400 --> 0:18:58.840 Edison than build this, Crucy got to work fabricating the 0:18:58.880 --> 0:19:03.240 pieces necessary to make the first phonograph prototype. The original 0:19:03.240 --> 0:19:07.399 phonograph had a cylindrical drum upon which Edison would wrap 0:19:07.440 --> 0:19:11.240 a sheet of tin foil. A needle would rest against 0:19:11.359 --> 0:19:13.760 the tin foil, and when Edison would turn a crank, 0:19:14.040 --> 0:19:17.359 the cylinder would rotate and the needle would move along 0:19:17.400 --> 0:19:21.000 the length of the cylinder, slowly, creating a spiral groove 0:19:21.040 --> 0:19:23.280 as it did so. The needle was connected to a 0:19:23.320 --> 0:19:28.000 simple microphone's diaphragm, and by speaking very loudly into the microphone, 0:19:28.040 --> 0:19:32.240 which was essentially a trumpet, Edison can make the diaphragm vibrate, 0:19:32.359 --> 0:19:35.520 transmitting those vibrations to the needle, which would then create 0:19:35.640 --> 0:19:39.399 indentations in the tin foil, so the needles path and 0:19:39.440 --> 0:19:42.919 that spiral would vary according to those vibrations. On that 0:19:43.040 --> 0:19:47.560 first try, Edison recorded a nursery rhyme Mary had a 0:19:47.600 --> 0:19:51.080 little lamb. After turning the crank and speaking loudly into 0:19:51.119 --> 0:19:55.280 the microphone, Edison stopped. He removed the needle from the cylinder. 0:19:55.520 --> 0:19:58.399 He raised the cylinder back to its starting point, placed 0:19:58.440 --> 0:20:02.560 a slightly different needle attachment against the tinfoil, which was 0:20:02.640 --> 0:20:06.199 connected to a small loudspeaker, and then turned the crank 0:20:06.280 --> 0:20:09.800 and the machine began to rotate the drum again, and 0:20:10.960 --> 0:20:15.320 the most amazing thing happened, the machine reproduced Edison's words. 0:20:15.840 --> 0:20:20.440 According to Edison, everyone was astonished that the device actually worked, 0:20:20.800 --> 0:20:24.199 and Edison himself said he was always terrified by inventions 0:20:24.240 --> 0:20:27.240 that worked the first time he tried them. Edison would 0:20:27.280 --> 0:20:29.800 create several more phonographs in this way, most of which 0:20:29.800 --> 0:20:34.680 were reserved for demonstration purposes. Those invention, while serviceable, had 0:20:34.720 --> 0:20:37.159 some big drawbacks, and one of those was that it 0:20:37.240 --> 0:20:41.040 was pretty fragile. Specifically, the tinfoil was really fragile. It 0:20:41.080 --> 0:20:44.359 would rip easily after just a couple of playbacks, and 0:20:44.560 --> 0:20:47.239 it would take some other innovative folks to come up 0:20:47.280 --> 0:20:50.960 with an alternative to tinfoil to push the the invention 0:20:51.000 --> 0:20:53.760 a little further. I'll talk about them in just a second, 0:20:54.040 --> 0:20:57.160 but first let's take a quick break to thank our sponsor. 0:21:03.800 --> 0:21:06.159 Hey guys, it's Jonathan and before we jump into the 0:21:06.160 --> 0:21:08.240 rest of this show, I just want to give a 0:21:08.320 --> 0:21:11.200 quick shout out to a new podcast that's come out 0:21:11.240 --> 0:21:15.960 from How Stuff Works, the soundtrack show hosted by David Collins, 0:21:16.400 --> 0:21:18.959 and I just thought it was thematically linked to the 0:21:19.000 --> 0:21:23.639 whole turntable idea. This is a show that's specifically about 0:21:23.760 --> 0:21:28.320 movie scores and soundtracks and how they affect the way 0:21:28.359 --> 0:21:32.120 we perceive the films, the life they have beyond films, 0:21:32.160 --> 0:21:35.359 the inspiration and influences that went into the creation of 0:21:35.359 --> 0:21:40.120 those soundtracks. This is my jam, guys. I love soundtracks. 0:21:40.280 --> 0:21:43.760 So if you are really passionate about music in general 0:21:43.840 --> 0:21:46.879 and movie music in particular, check it out. It's the 0:21:46.960 --> 0:21:49.879 Soundtracks Show. You can find it on iTunes or wherever 0:21:49.920 --> 0:21:53.399 you get your podcasts. And now back to the show. Alright. 0:21:53.440 --> 0:21:57.440 So Edison's invention was met with enthusiasm, but others also 0:21:57.480 --> 0:22:00.919 wondered how the design might be proved upon to get 0:22:00.920 --> 0:22:03.800 a better quality of audio and more robust recordings that 0:22:03.800 --> 0:22:06.800 could last longer than a couple of playbacks, and a 0:22:06.840 --> 0:22:10.840 couple of scientists named Charles Sumner Tainter and chi Chester 0:22:11.040 --> 0:22:13.960 Bell proposed an alternative. By the way to Jester. Bell 0:22:14.280 --> 0:22:17.480 was a cousin of Alexander Graham Bell, and they both 0:22:17.560 --> 0:22:22.479 worked for Alexander Graham Bell's Volta Laboratory. Alexander Graham Bell 0:22:22.600 --> 0:22:26.960 got a ten thousand dollar grant as the inventor of 0:22:27.000 --> 0:22:29.800 the telephone and he set up this volta laboratory using 0:22:29.800 --> 0:22:32.919 that money. They said that instead of using a sheet 0:22:33.040 --> 0:22:36.359 of tinfoil wrapped around the cylinder, they were going to 0:22:36.560 --> 0:22:40.960 use a cylinder of cardboard that would be coded with wax. 0:22:41.520 --> 0:22:44.280 Another difference between the two methods was that the wax 0:22:44.359 --> 0:22:48.720 cylinder phonographs would etch or engrave patterns on the wax, 0:22:48.720 --> 0:22:52.720 whereas the tin foil predecessors depended upon indentations in the 0:22:52.760 --> 0:22:56.200 tin foil. So think of it as you know, as 0:22:56.359 --> 0:23:00.640 as going left and right across a surface, as opposed 0:23:00.680 --> 0:23:04.360 to in and out of it using more or less 0:23:04.400 --> 0:23:08.280 pressure from a stylus. The cylinders, as I said, were 0:23:08.320 --> 0:23:12.480 made of cardboard coated in wax. Uh. They had a 0:23:12.720 --> 0:23:16.720 spring powered motor that in at least the later versions 0:23:16.840 --> 0:23:19.520 of this methodology, they used a spring powered motor to 0:23:19.640 --> 0:23:22.720 provide power to move the components, which meant you no 0:23:22.760 --> 0:23:26.359 longer had to depend upon a hand crank to turn everything, 0:23:26.520 --> 0:23:30.159 because if you're trying to keep a steady pace turning 0:23:30.160 --> 0:23:32.440 a hand crank, chances are you're gonna slow down or 0:23:32.480 --> 0:23:35.040 speed up at different parts. That's going to affect the 0:23:35.160 --> 0:23:37.680 quality of the recording. They wanted to have a better 0:23:37.720 --> 0:23:42.960 way of maintaining consistency, so they went with this spring motor. 0:23:43.000 --> 0:23:45.040 Now you still had to wind up the motor. So 0:23:45.080 --> 0:23:48.720 if you've ever seen any images of people winding up 0:23:49.160 --> 0:23:53.119 gramophone very quickly and then allowing it to start to 0:23:53.160 --> 0:23:56.080 turn and then using the needle, that's essentially what's happening here. 0:23:56.280 --> 0:23:58.760