ANTIQUE CYLINDER PHONOGRAPH ANGELICA by EWC Circa 1903

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I am ebaying this and one or two other antiques for an 85 year old family friend who is fit and well but wants to put some finances aside for a 'rainy day'. Usually I'd give 10% to Help for Heroes but on this occassion as 100% of the profits will go to a good cause I'll make an exception. In 1908 the Grandfather of our friend took the train from Alton to Leek in Staffordshire and bought this phonograph for his 18 year old son, James Burton, who was suffering from T.B., in order to cheer him up. Sadly the young man died that same year. The phonograph and record collection have remained in the family ever since. In the last two weeks I've done a great deal of research on this item and have learned the following; "Angelica" was one of the brand names used by John G. Murdoch & Sons, also the Murdoch Trading Company, a large firm of musical instrument wholesalers who also had their own retail outlets in many towns throughout the UK. The phonograph was made by 'Excelsior', Excelsiorwerke Coln, (EWC), in Germany. "No Edison", the website about antique phonographs other than Edison phonographs shows the exact same model, the "Excelsior Open Works" and provides some detail. For those with an interest in all aspects of the history surrounding this phonograph I have found the following obituary for John G. Murdoch; Born in 1830 at Huntingtower, Perthshire. Early in life he was apprenticed to block cutting for printing on cotton, but block printing having been supplanted by machine printing immediately after the end of his apprenticeship, he preferred not to be tied to a decaying trade and signed articles for a second apprenticeship to the new process. As an apprenticeship in those days was invariably for seven years, he was about 27 years old [ie 1857] before his apprenticeship days were over, although he had begun at the age of 13. After being engaged for several years as a machine printer he began to long for a wider field for his energies, and although his employers were reluctant to part with him, and promised him rapid promotion if he would remain, he relinquished the cotton printing and connected himself with the firm of Messrs. Collins & Co. , of Glasgow, who were developing business rapidly as publishers of Family Bibles and similar works. He established successful agencies for their publications in Glasgow , Liverpool, Manchester , and other towns in the North of England. In 1871 he came to London and began publishing on his own account, his principal business continuing to be in Family Bibles, of which he issued editions in Welsh and Dutch, as well as English. At that time the Family Bible was more popular than it is today, and Mr Murdoch's annual output for a number of years was more than 30,000, which were supplied to all parts of the Empire. It was the custom in those days to give a premium plate to purchasers of the Family Bible and this eventually led Mr Murdoch into print publishing. At the time when the oleograph was in it prime and publishers were eager to issue first-class pictures in the artistic style, he established a great business in this department. He secured paintings from some of the most eminent artists of the day, such as the late Alphonse de Neuville, Richard Beavis, Frederick Goodall, R.A., Phil Morris, A.R.A., Robert Müller, and others, and from these he reproduced pictures in the best style of colour printing then extant. Several of these pictures had the good fortune to attract the attention of Her late Majesty Queen Victoria, and owing to her patronage and the merits of the pictures themselves, they commanded an enormous sale. About the same period the trade in photograph albums arose to great proportions in England , and as it had been for many years the practice to put a family portrait register into the Family Bible, it was an easy transition for the great Family Bible publisher to become an album publisher as well, and that on a large scale. This album publishing had a great influence on the future of Mr Murdoch's b... read more

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