Who Invented The Phonograph – In 1877 Thomas Alva Edison invented the phonograph, one of the most important inventions of the entire 19th century. The intention of this device was to record and reproduce sound, thus giving the opportunity to everyone to access music, something that at that time was reserved only for people who belonged to the upper class.
- A phonograph is a device quite similar to a compact disc player, except that the records are made with wax instead of aluminum and plastic, and instead of using a laser beam, a needle was used to read the sound.
- The phonograph The first recording that Thomas Alva Edison made has several versions.
- One says he went to himself and others to one of his assistants.
- He carried out this recording on a strip of metallic paper that was rolled up in a cylinder that was turning.
- Although Edison is considered to be the inventor of this device, the truth is that two Frenchmen, known as Charles Cros and Leon Scott, were the ones who developed the precursor machines of Edison’s invention.
The First Phonograph bore little resemblance to all those who would quickly follow it since it was a very rudimentary loudspeaker.
It must also be said that after inventing it, Edison lost interest for a time in the phonograph, but not so Alexandre Granhan Bell, inventor of the telephone himself, nor did his apprentice Sumner Tainter.
The two of them decided to make some improvements to this device by developing a better way to create recordings. For this, using wax when covering the cylinder, instead of metallic paper.
They called this device a graphophone. The original purpose As we have already commented, this device was created with the intention of being able to make sound reach everyone, but neither Bell nor Edison saw it reach the masses in order to entertain them.
In 1890 both the phonograph and the graphophone were promoted for use in offices as dictation devices, but in neither case did they make much money.
In any case, they also began to be used for entertainment and could be seen in amusement parks where they operated with coins. It was not until 1901 when a famous company known as the Victor Talking Machine Company began to distribute phonographs with great success.
At that time phonographs began to be known as Victrolas and they came to mark the beginning of the music industry to this day. Curiosities One hundred years after Edison invented his phonograph, NASA thought that if humans like music so much, maybe aliens too.
For that reason, two twelve-inch gold discs were attached to the Voyager 1 and 2 shuttles, tasked with exploring interstellar space and planets. What we don’t know is if the aliens liked the music they sent them!
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