The Edison phonograph monthly (Jan-Dec 1910)

Edison Phonograph Monthly, Sept., 1910 An Amberola in the Heart of a Wild Mining Country The Sunday Oregonian, of Portland, Oregon, in its issue of July 31, introduces a half-page illustrated article describing the milling and smelting plants of the Washougal Gold and Copper Mining Company, Skamania County, Washington, in the following entertaining fashion: "A lone prospector, wandering through the rugged hills near the headwaters of turbulent Shirt Creek in lower Skamania County, Washington, a few evenings ago, was startled to hear the soft, swreet strains of Verdi's classic 'Rigoletto' floating on the still twilight air. He paused and listened, for such sounds as these he had never heard in that untraveled region before. Spellbound by the music, he waited a while, then started in the direction from which the sounds seemed to emanate. "His trained feet and sturdy limbs quickly carried him through the tangled underbrush and jagged rocks that lay between him and the source of the charming notes. Soon he stood at the entrance of a long, airy dining hall brilliantly illuminated with electric incandescent lamps, and a square, upright box whose highly polished sides shone brightly under the glare of the lights, standing in the center of the room. Around it •was gathered a group of twenty or more brightfaced, horny-handed miners clad in the picturesque garb of their profession. As soon as they spied him they bade him a hearty welcome. MUSIC CHEERS WORKMEN. "He was in the camp of the Washougal Gold and Copper Mining Company. The piece of furniture which had arrested his first attention was a mahogany 'Amberola' containing the finest instruments that can be placed in the manufacture of such a machine. This accounted for the music that he had heard far up on the hillside. "The cheery disposition of the men and the kindly attention that was shown him soon placed him entirely at ease. He began to ask questions. " 'What is the cause of all this?' he inquired. "For an answer one of the men, with a jerk of his head, indicated a little, smooth-faced, ruddycheeked, gray-haired gentleman who stood with his arms folded complacently behind his back, his arms coatless and with his brown telescope hat hanging jauntily on the side of his head in school-boy fashion. His face beamed his delight as he listened to the music. The stranger had not noticed him before. " 'This is Mr. Mabee,' said one of the men who had acted as spokesman. The quiet gentleman stepped forward. He shook the prospector's hand and told him to make himself comfortable. Victuals and drinks were soon placed at his disposal. "Mr. Mabee, as he soon learned, is president of the Washougal Gold and Copper Mining Company and general manager of its properties. F. A. Mabee is the way his name appears on his checks." That's the way it appeared on the check tendered to the Graves Music Co., Edison Jobbers of Portland, Oregon, in payment of the Amberola in question. The sale of this particular instrument was a "rush" transaction. Mr. Mabee wanted an Edison Phonograph and some Records for his men —he wanted the best to be had— he wanted the outfit at once — and he wanted it shipped by express. He got it, just as it was ordered. After landing at the express office it was necessary to haul the goods twenty-five miles up into the mountains, but they finally reached their destination O. K. and are now providing entertainment for the rugged miners in the Washington wilds. This sale, so entirely unsolicited and unexpected, only goes to prove that there are unrecognized possibilities for the sale of high-priced Phonographs at the door of every Dealer. They will discover themselves to the Dealer who has the confidence and the enterprise to place an Amberola in stock and apprise the public of the fact. Two Letters from Two Dealers Two letters recently received in the same mail at the factory were so entirely dissimilar in tone and pointed so clearly to such a radical difference in methods that we are impelled to relate them in substance for the benefit of the trade. One came from a Dealer in a fair-sized Eastern city, — an old-established Dealer who hasn't yet awakened to the fact that a new order of things prevails in the Phonograph business today. His letter was querulous in tone. He couldn't understand, he said, what was the matter with the Phonograph business, but he was convinced that the bottom had dropped out of it. So far as he was concerned there was "absolutely nothing doing." He hadn't moved a machine "in a dog's day." Attachment sales were few and far between. Record sales were lifeless and steadily growing worse. It was the most pessimistic letter that ever reached this office, — one of those utterly despondent epistles that give one "the blues" to even open. Calamity wailed from every sentence of it, and it was plainly evident that its author was discouraged beyond the point of redemption. To complete the picture of hard luck which he had drawn, the Dealer closed with a bitter diatribe against the mail-order houses, which he complained had invaded the territory and were robbing him of what little business was possible ! In the same mail, as we stated, was a letter from a Dealer in the West — we assume that he will not object to our publishing his name — Mr. E. B. Hyatt, proprietor of the Portland (Ore.) Phonograph Agency, who wrote in to say, among other things of a like encouraging nature, that he is riding around in an automobile purchased from the profits of Amberola sales. That's all except the moral — is it necessary to point to it?