Thanks Allen, The article disagrees re: why the scales were not popular and as cited lays blame on the delicate mech. The writers in fact claim low volume was an issue. Now who knows, were they outside? One of the models illustrated does show a rather large brass horn out the top slanted toward the user. It would be interesting to hear one. It seems logical and the "price point" was quite high at a nickel. If one thinks about it at the turn of the last century not many options existed to know ones own weight. It also may be that the health/weight issue was a fabrication to get your penny or nickel. Back then a height/weight ratio was in use. never made much sense to me. Maybe Edward Bernays was at work.
It gives the phononuts something else to look for and good luck finding one. On Wed, Apr 21, 2010 at 9:02 AM, <[email protected]> wrote: > > In a message dated 4/20/2010 9:41:37 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, > [email protected] writes: (more info below) > > I recently read an interesting article from COCA Times I thought you all > may > find interesting. COCA stands for Coin Operated Collector Association BTW. > > The article by Jim and Merlyn Collings is about penny scales. > It seems the first *talking* penny scales originated out of England. > George Moore submitted patents in 1902 (x) for a talking scale. The Moore > Talking Machine Company was founded in Boston and morphed into The > American Talking Scale Company. These scales are very rare. Seems they > broke down > often due to the sensitive nature of the mechanisms. They employed a disc > record that was mounted vertically and you could see it work through the > glass in the scale. These were nickel machines so it was big step over the > penny machine profit wise. One of the options was a slug rejector that > would > announce "NO GOOD." > > > ---------------- > There is a good (brief) history of the talking scale in PHP. > > The real reason they failed in the market place (post-1901) is this part > of the description: > > [From the original sales brochure]: "The voice [of the record] is so loud > and distinct that when it calls out the weight, it attracts others to use > it." > > Hmmm... how many people, then or now, would want their weight loudly > announced to a random group of people? > > The weight-announcements went up by two-pound increments, with the > heaviest amount (250 lbs) at the rim. The only known such (10") record was > a > "Zonophone" pressing. > > Allen > _www.phonobooks.com_ (http://www.phonobooks.com) > > _______________________________________________ > Phono-L mailing list > http://phono-l.oldcrank.org > _______________________________________________ Phono-L mailing list http://phono-l.oldcrank.org
