Rare Record: A 1940s Home Recorded Presto Disc

The Presto disc is like a burnable CD, a recordable vinyl record! It contains recordings made in 1948-49. One side contains "Buster Butterfly" recorded in October of 1948, and the other has "Pointers on giving a speech" recorded in May of 1949. The label, written in pencil, lists the "Recorder" as Betty Herron. I found it at a garage sale in the early 2000s for $1 and thought it looked interesting, because it was a record with 4 holes in it. (I'm assuming the extra holes were necessary to hold the disc in place with additional force while the lathe cut grooves in it.) This video is our first attempt to listen to this record, which as it turns out is a bit of a challenge:

First, a record player that has a 78 RPM speed is not as common as it used to be. I only have one left. 78s are supposed to use a different needle/stylus. Many record players of the 60s and 70s (such as the 1966 and 1969 RCA consoles I show in other videos) have this setting but my stylus doesn't. I just used the LP stylus anyway this one time..

Second, as I found out when playing this record, the groove is cut in a reverse method than a standard record. In other words if you drop the needle, the tonearm will move backwards from the center out to the edge. Normal vinyl starts at the outer edge and moves in to the center. (Interestingly, this is also one of the differences between CD and DVD and a multi-player needs to know it). My 1978 Zenith Allegro with a BSR changer didn't like this when I tried to move the tonearm manually to the center and tried to reject the record, so I disabled automatic shutoff temporarily.

The audio quality on this record was not very good. It is full of scratches and I am probably using an incompatible stylus. However, I was able to recover it - it’s basically just a lady reading a short story. The "Buster Butterfly" recording is at the end of this video. The other side, "Pointers on Giving a Speech" was so quiet and not intelligible so it was not really worth uploading.

Presto was a US company that started making recorders in 1930 with a "kit" that changed a player into an aluminum disc recorder. This record is from the 1940s so is several iterations later. From some Internet searches, it looks like the made machines for radio stations and even made tape recorders - which eventually took over in the broadcast and TV industry. Tape could be edited and erased which of course would have been easier to use.

Although I don't have the machine to make these records, I remembered seeing a Bob Hope movie from the 40s where such a machine figured into the plot. And finding that movie on YouTube today, I can see the record he's using has the same 4-hole pattern as this one - perhaps it's a Presto?

Although the recording on this disc was not particularly interesting, what I do find interesting from a technology point of view is a pattern of home recording technology emerging on an existing medium as time goes on. Another more modern example would be that CDs came first, then later CD-Rs for home users. Same thing with DVDs, then DVD-R, DVD-RW, etc. Or even seeing moving pictures at a theater, then later on a home on television. Even now the fact that I can broadcast this video to you without the help of a TV station feels like a pattern of technology becoming more "democratic" as time goes on...

Thanks for watching this video. If you’ve ever used a Presto recorder of this era, please comment and let us know if it sounded better than this!

#Vinyl
#RareRecord

If you like old technology, consider subscribing to our channel. Here is a link to a playlist with our other vintage technology videos:

   • Old 1969 RCA New Vista Color TV - Tur...  

...And the Bob Hope movie "My Favorite Brunette" from 1947:
   • My Favorite Brunette (1947) BOB HOPE  

...And a Web site that lists some history of the Presto company:
http://www.prestohistory.com/Presto.htm

Video Index:

0:00 Intro
0:30 Who was Presto
0:55 Bob Hope using a Presto Disc
1:51 Close up of the label
2:49 Playing a non-standard record
3:15 A groove recorded backwards!
3:51 Disabling auto stop on my BSR
4:30 Conclusion
5:02 Buster Butterfly by Betty Herron