I have the pleasure of owning a Columbia Grafonola, but sadly it no longer works and is instead functioning as a furniture piece. My friend is the lucky owner of an Emerson Victrola (of which a portion of a record is recorded above). When she played it for me the other night, I realized just how different her Victrola is from my Grafonola in looks, which made me wonder what separates the two? What I discovered is that there were as many off brands of "Victrolas" as there are today of televisions. By far, the most fascinating website I came across (which has been meticulously researched) is: https://www.antiquephono.org/brand-talking-machines-r-j-wakeman/
My friend's player has an external horn, whereas others (including my own) had the horn incorporated into the piece itself for a more aesthetic "furniture" look.
This craze of making the phono look more like a beautiful piece of furniture and less like a machine took off in the 1920s with the advent of the PHONO LAMP RECORDER! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d08GEz6BrTA
I now have a new item to covet...if only the lamp could be shaped like a leg...
This idea that the entertainment system should blend in with the aesthetics of one's home seems to have been the birth of the 1960s entertainment console:
I'm sure in many ways the aestheticism of my Grafonola lends itself to why I keep a non-functioning piece around. This idea leaves me with a further thought: did the 19th century bring us the leisure of having our machinery be eye-catching, as opposed to functional? Put another way, I'm prone to believe that since the industrial revolution brought machines into the daily environments of the common man/woman, we counteracted this dulling onslaught of mechanization by designing our home machines to be beautiful. So perhaps we have the Victrola (and all its off-brand models) to thank for our modern appreciation of aesthetic, functional pieces? Eat your heart out Ikea!