The talking machine world (Jan-Dec 1908)

64 THE TALKING MACHINE WORLD. PARKER'S PASTIME PUZZLES Should Prove a Big Holiday Seller With the Talking Machine Trade. A genuine craze has been created in Boston and other New England cities, which has rapidly spread to all of the social centers in the East. This fad or craze is for the new picture puzzles made by Parker Bros. (Inc.), of Salem, Mass., called Pastimes. The most distinguished members of society are giving more time to Pastime picture puzzles at present than to any other amusement. It is known to be a fact that President Roosevelt himself has been suflBciently diverted to actually spend hours over the delightful amusement of putting together the beautiful pictures which constitute the Pastime puzzles. Pastime puzzles are unlike the usual juvenile picture puzzles and are intended for adults. They are fine art pictures mounted with special cement upon three-ply wooden stock and sawed into a great number of pieces. The puzzles retail all the way from 50 cents to ?7.50, and Parker Bros, have many special orders for puzzles of very large number of pieces that retail as high as $10. The sale of f2 and $3 styles has run to a large number of thousands. As the fad has now spread to all large centers, all dealers having a good class of trade can dispose of hundreds of these puzzles if they once make it kno-mi that they have them. Handsome placards are sent with the puzzles. The goods cost from $3.50 a dozen upward. The Parker plant at Salem, Mass., which has produced so many famous games, as Ping Pong, Diabolo, Pit and other great successes, is running an entire factory on these Pastime puzzles. For the purpose of cutting these puzzles very fine imported saws are used on specially made machinery. Such fine saws could not be used on the ordinary jig saw machines with which most people are familiar. As a side line for talking machine dealers these high-class puzzles are money-makers. The finest booksellers in New York, such as Scribner's, Putnam's, etc., are selling them as fast as they can get them from the Salem factory. GKRMAN POST CARD SITUATION. Consul-General T. St. John Gaffney, of Dresden, states that the exportation of German picture post cards has recently diminished considerably. The foreign demand is, however, still great, amounting to about 500,000,000 since the beginning of the year to July 1. Compared with the previous year, this shows a diminution of 150,000,000. The United States is said to be Germany's best customer, followed by England. Asia and Australia are also good patrons of this form of art industry. HOW MOVING PICTURES ARE MADE. Four thousand people packed the space in front of Borough Hall, Brooklyn, while they gazed at a baseball bulletin board. The police moved here and there clearing the car tracks. Up came a boy. He didn't look much like a boy — because he was an actor. Behind him toddled an old woman, and behind her a stage manager, a camera man, and a helper. Scarcely had the old woman established herself on the curbstone before a trolley car came clanging down the avenue. The boy spat professionally on his hands. The old lady gathered herself together. The car was thirty feet away and bowling along in lively fashion, writes Harris Merton Lyon in the New Broadway Magazine. "Now, go!" yelled the stage manager. Out onto the tracks she went. It was a business of seconds and split seconds. Subtly somewhere a camera began clicking off its little stamp pictures, the photographer turning away at a crank like a housewife grinding coffee. "Now, you!" was the second command. This time the boy leaped out. The car came jarring to a standstill. The motorman jumped down to the rescue. "Keep back!" The stage manager again. "Let the boy save her." Then the crowd took its eyes off the baseball results long enough to stare at the picture of a young man carrying an old woman in his arms to safety out from under the very wheels of the terrible trolley car. "Who got hit?" "Was the old lady hurt?" "What is it, an accident?" No; it was the American Vitagraph Co.'s crew of fivedollar-a-day actors, bound on their day's work of telling in pictures the heroic "Life of a New York Lad" — six hundred feet of it, and twenty pictures to the foot. DUTY ON FEATHERED POST CARDS. In the appeal of A. H. Ringk & Co., et al., against the assessment of duty on feathered post cards, i. e., souvenir post cards on one side of which appear pictures of birds printed by processes other than lithographic, and which are ornamented by feathers, as manufactured feathers, the United States General Appraisers upheld the collector's classification. An appeal being taken from that decision to the Circuit Court for the southern district of New York, however, the court reversed the ruling of the board and held in Ringk vs. United States that the so-called feathered post cards were properly dutiable as printed matter. The Treasury Department has announced its acquiescence, and the ruling of the court cited has thus become final. In accordance with it, and on the record in the cases now on appeal, the government sustains the claim in these protests under paragraph 403, and the decision of the collector in each case assessing duty on the post cards as manufactured feathers is modified accordingly. All other claims in said protests are herewith overruled. IN THE PElfNY ARCADE. The graphophone and the phonograph had been speaking alternately for some time. Both had discussed the tariff, injunctions, the Philippines, trusts, guaranteed bank deposits and tainted political contributions, when one of them passed a slighting remark upon the big orchestrion which stood at the other end of the hall. At this the other protested with much warmth, and while both were talking together at the top of their voices there was a roar and a rumble and a crash and the orchestrion made so much noise that the crowd speedily assembled at that end of the room, leaving the graphophone and the phonograph in silence and alone. Toward night, when the orchestrion had run down, the graphophone ventured to ask the phonograph how it was that the orchestrion had not only drowned them out, but had attracted all the people. "Because," said the phonograph, "the orchestrion is a brass band, and there never was anybody or anything that could talk against it." The moral of this simple tale is that if a man or a machine would be heard great care must be taken not to start up the big noise. — -New York World. SHRP-SHAVR SALES GROWING RAPIDLY. The Shrp-Shavr Safety Razor Co., New York, report a steady growth in the sales of the ShrpShavr Safety Razor and blades. This razor sells at retail for 25 cents, and its shaving qualities are satisfactory, the blades especially being of very superior quality. The advantage of the Shrp-Shavr is that it opens up an immense safety razor field that has, so far, been little touched. Hundreds of new safety razor buyers are induced to try the ShrpShavr because of its low price — 25 cents: and the merits of the Shrp-Shavr and blades are such as to hold them and make them permanent safety razor users. This means an impetus not only to this 25-cent market, but in the market for higher-priced razors and in shaving accessories — soap, shaving brushes, talcum powder, bay rum, etc. The Shrp-Shavr is, therefore, proving profitable to both jobbers and retailers. The volume of sales of the Shrp-Shavr is very large and the aggregate profit inviting. At the same time it stimulates the sale of shaving accessories and other lines. SECOND MEETING IN FEBRUARY. The National Sporting Goods Dealers' Association will hold their seiond meeting some time in February, the place not having as yet been determined upon. Meanwhile the officers and members are doing their utmost to increase the nuMubershi]), and dealers all over the country are sending in their applications. The officers of the association are as follows: Charles Antoine, Chicago, president; T. W. Stake, New York city, vice-president; C. J. Schmelzer, Kansas City, Mo.. treas\irer; W. B. Jarvis, Grand Rapids, Mich., secretary: directors: Charles Antoine. T. W. Stake, Charles J. Schmelzer. Justus Von l.engerke, R, S, Kennedy, Ad, R, Roll, and R. J, Leacock. GUNS, REVOLVERS, OPTICAL GOODS, ETC. Are Good Side Lines for Phonograph Dealers We here illustrate, describe and price a few specialties that will put some go into your business. The goods are all right and prices 30 to 25 per cent, lower than others. Write for confidential ^yholesale prices. WITH HAMMER Retail Price. $5.00 AUTOMATIC REVOLVERS Improved Model American-made Automatic Revolvers, High Finish, Perfect Model. HAMMERLESS AUTOMATIC REVOLVERS 32 and 38 Cal Retail Price. $5.50 "UNDERBUY AND UNDERSELL" IH ttie vllill iirhiiliiN of success In tniile. llfre i» yimr opixirUinlty. National Aims Co. Single Ouris, .Mitimmtlc Shell K.lector-, Kctall I'rlce, ».'i.OO. Don't pay the gun trust $4.25 for their guns when you can gel a NATIONAL ARMS CO. GUN f.^;? $3.50 NEW LINE S°^i"on Revolvers RETAIL PRICE, $2.50 Write for Wholesale Prices NEW LINE SMOKELESS POWDER SHOTGUN SHELLS 20 tH T ccn(. under the Association Dealer's prices. WRITE for our Cnnfidcnliiil Wholesale PriiH' l.isi KIRTLAND BROS. & CO., Distributing Agents, 90 Chambers St., New York