Shyvers' Multiphone Jukebox Competitor from the Thirties thru the Fifties w/key
$
1,300
Favourite Auctions
To save auctions to your favourites, please login
If you don't have an account, please register
Description
Sometimes you find these under either ART DECO or JUKEBOX listings but a more apt description might be to refer to it as the true pre-cursor to Napster, Spotify or Pandora.
Is it a jukebox? Is it a radio? Is it a telephone? It’s none of those and yet, it’s all of them. Just as you might call in to a disc jockey to request a tune to be played on the radio, the Shyvers’ MULTIPHONE is connected via telephone wires to a room full of female disc jockeys in Seattle who are surrounded by a vast record library and a multitude of turntables.
The customer chooses the music selection from an array of over 200 tunes, inserts a given number of coins and speaks to his very own “disc jockey” who retrieves the chosen records and plays them on her turntable with the sound traveling over the telephone line to the speaker located within the bottom of the Multiphone. At a time when most jukeboxes offered only 24 selections, this unique device (primarily placed on the counters or in booths of luncheonettes) competed handily with Wurlitzer, Seeburg, Rockola and other jukebox manufacturers.
A very detailed list of instructions is given to each operator for the primary purpose of teaching her how to retrieve, play and return a record without chipping it or scratching it. The most ludicrous of these include:
“Smile when you appear on microphone.”
“Don’t be sarcastic or sharp over the mikes…”
“Don’t play free records for any favorite location or friend.”
“Don’t under any consideration cheapen yourself or this business by making dates over this system.”
This unit accepts dimes and the listed 200 songs indicate it was used in the fifties. Made of cast aluminum, it is 17” tall and very heavy.
Last month, a similar item sold on Ebay for $2000. Check it out. Indicate SOLD LISTINGS and in the SEARCH window put in Ebay number 362390763555.
Thank you for looking.
price rating
