Eldridge R. Johnson
Eldridge Reeves Johnson (born February 6, 1867 in Wilmington , Delaware ; † November 15, 1945 in Moorestown , New Jersey ) was an American engineer and entrepreneur from Camden City who, in collaboration with Emil Berliner , developed the shellac record and the accompanying gramophone . He also founded the Victor Talking Machine Company together with Berliner on October 3rd .
biography
Scull Machine Shop
At the beginning of his professional career, Johnson worked as a mechanic in a small machine factory, which bore the name of its founder, Andrew Scull, who founded it as a professional starting board for his son John Warwick Scull. The Scull Machine Shop , at that time also trading as Standard Machine Shop , had its business premises in Camden , New Jersey and on the one hand offered the repair of household and agricultural equipment, and on the other hand the construction of mechanical equipment for use in technical areas with its production.
After Johnson had already turned his back on the company shortly after it was founded, Warwik Skull died in 1988, leaving behind a bookbinding machine that was only partially developed. As a result, Andrew Skull decided to ask Johnson to return to the company's headquarters in order to have the incomplete work of his son completed. Johnson gave in to Andrew Skull's insistence and from then on worked as a project manager and manager, where he was able to complete the planning of the bookbinding machine in 1890, so that the production of the devices could begin.
A year later, in 1891, after a trip to the west coast of the United States , Johnson returned, now as an equal partner to Andrew Skulls, back to the machine factory, which was in dire straits with regard to its business goals for bookbinding machines. Johnson constructed the apparatus for the production of books from scratch, with the aim of reducing the purchase price, in the hope of being able to influence the sales figures positively with this measure, while at the same time gaining new customers. Ultimately, with the onset of success, Johnson took over the Scull Machine Shop in its entirety in 1894 , in order to continue to operate it under his own name from now on.
Eldridge R. Johnson Manufacturing Company
Johnson was first tried by Berliner when it came to the development and series production of a suitable spring mechanism for his gramophone devices. The market launch took place in 1896. The innovations helped the product division to achieve an enormous increase in sales.
Johnson founded the Victor Talking Machine Company , also known as Victor Records after the record label . One of his devices was named Victrola. The company later went to RCA. The part of the name Victor can still be found today as an abbreviation in the Japanese company name of JVC .
When it came to the case between Berliner and his salesman Frank Seaman because of a secretly built competing production of plagiarism under the product name Zonophon , which Berliners should have preferred to the production of Johnson at Seaman's request, intense legal disputes arose in some of them Johnson was drawn into it.
In the end, the newcomer Seaman was able to enforce a relatively extensive cancellation of various trademark rights of Berliners through his lawyers. Berliner withdrew from the USA around 1900 and at the same time transferred numerous rights to Johnson, who continued to run them for several decades as a product and brand in a market that was at times blessed with growth.
In 1928 he was elected a member of the American Philosophical Society .
literature
- Frank Hoffmann & Howard Ferstler: Encyclopedia of Recorded Sound, Routledge, London 2005, ISBN 978-0-415-93835-8 .
Web links
- Eldridge R. Johnson in the database of Find a Grave (English)
- How a Man with an idea made millions in twelve years , Times Machine, The New York Times (PDF). Retrieved August 12, 2019.
Individual evidence
- ^ Member History: Eldridge R. Johnson. American Philosophical Society, accessed October 14, 2018 .
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Johnson, Eldridge R. |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Johnson, Eldridge Reeves |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American entrepreneur |
| DATE OF BIRTH | February 6, 1867 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Wilmington, Delaware |
| DATE OF DEATH | November 15, 1945 |
| Place of death | Moorestown, New Jersey |