The American Record Company was an American

record label A record label, or record company, is a brand or trademark of music recordings and music videos, or the company that owns it. Sometimes, a record label is also a publishing company that manages such brands and trademarks, coordinates the produ ...

that was in business from 1904 to 1906.

History

The American Record Company (commonly abbreviated as "ARCo") was founded by Ellsworth A. Hawthorne and Horace Sheble, formerly designers of accessories for Edison Records machines at their Philadelphia-based bicycle shop; in a previous venture, they had issued a small run of brown-wax cylinders in the mid-1890s. Hawthorne and Sheble partnered with John O. Prescott, whose brother Frederick worked with International Talking Machine in Berlin, which marketed

Odeon Records Odeon Records is a record label founded in 1903 by Max Straus and Heinrich Zuntz of the International Talking Machine Company in Berlin, Germany. The label's name and logo come from the Odéon-Théâtre de l'Europe in Paris. History Straus an ...

. The new company was based in

Springfield, Massachusetts Springfield is a city in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, United States, and the seat of Hampden County. Springfield sits on the eastern bank of the Connecticut River near its confluence with three rivers: the western Westfield River, the ...

, though they maintained factories in Bridgeport, CT and Philadelphia; recordings were made in a studio in New York City. American principally produced single-sided, lateral-cut

disc records A phonograph record (also known as a gramophone record, especially in British English), or simply a record, is an analog sound storage medium in the form of a flat disc with an inscribed, modulated spiral groove. The groove usually starts nea ...

on blue wax, although two-sided issues and standard, black shellac appeared towards the end of the company's run.

Logo

The label of the discs featured artwork depicting a Native American with a

smoking pipe A smoking pipe is used to inhale the smoke of a burning substance; most common is a tobacco pipe, which can also accommodate almost any other substance. Pipes are commonly made from briar, heather, corn, meerschaum, clay, cherry, glass, porcela ...

listening to a front-mount disc

phonograph A phonograph, in its later forms also called a gramophone (as a trademark since 1887, as a generic name in the UK since 1910) or since the 1940s called a record player, or more recently a turntable, is a device for the mechanical and analogu ...

of undetermined manufacture; American Record Company advertising commonly marketed them as "Indian Records". Several variations of the "Indian" label exist, differing only in minor details. Most ARCo records are single sided; with their double-sided records, apparently the combination of sides were randomly chosen. The company would press any two sides paired, if the buyer met the minimum-order qualification. These records are notable for being blue in color, rather than the usual black, pressed from a shellac compound called ''Empedite'' which reputedly delivered better sound quality than standard black shellac. The records appear to have been numbered using a sequence which began at 030000; the highest number known is 031435. The records exist in 7-inch, 10-inch and 10.75-inch sizes, with the latter size being derived from its connection with Odeon, which also used that size. The seven-inch discs used a different numbering sequence and seem to have only been produced for a short time. Some export pressings for Britain carried the "American Odeon Record" logo.

Legacy

Unlike most American producers of discs apart from Victor and Columbia in the first decade of the twentieth century, American Record Company made their own recordings in direct contravention to existing patents. The most important contribution made by ARCo to the history of recorded sound is that they made the earliest surviving records of Hawaiian music in several discs credited to the ''Royal Hawaiian Troubadours''; this was a group led by July Paka. The house band was called the ''Regimental Band of the Republic'' and was responsible for most of the remaining instrumental selections on the label, in addition to providing accompaniments to singers. Other performers were mainly drawn from the ranks of singers that worked for Victor, Columbia and the cylinder companies, recording many of the same songs that they did elsewhere. Many ARCos are anonymous, though just as many if not more do carry an accurate credit as to the performer. Collectors of early records do value ARCOs; while not as common as early Columbias or Victors, they survive in decent numbers, especially when compared to discs on labels that they provided masters to, such as Busy Bee, Kalamazoo and Peerless. In Europe, their releases appeared on Pelican, Leader, American Odeon and Odeon.

Roster

A listing of some of the artists that appeared on American Record Company. *

Henry Burr Henry Burr (January 15, 1882 – April 6, 1941) was a Canadian singer, radio performer and producer. He was born Harry Haley McClaskey and used Henry Burr as one of his many pseudonyms, in addition to Irving Gillette, Henry Gillette, Alfred Alex ...

Arthur Collins (singer) Arthur Francis Collins (February 7, 1864 – August 2, 1933) was an American baritone who was one of the most prolific and beloved of pioneer recording artists, regarded in his day as "King of the Ragtime Singers". Biography He was born in Phil ...

Collins and Harlan Collins & Harlan, the team of American singers Arthur Collins and Byron G. Harlan, formed a popular comic duo between 1903 and 1926. They sang ragtime standards as well as what were known as "coon songs" – music sung by white performers in a bl ...

* Billy Golden *

Byron G. Harlan Byron George Harlan (August 29, 1861 – September 11, 1936) was an American singer from Kansas, a comic minstrel singer and balladeer who often recorded with Arthur Collins. The two together were often billed as "Collins & Harlan". Solo rec ...

* Billy Heins *

Anna Held Helene Anna Held (19 March 1872 – 12 August 1918) was a Polish-French stage performer on Broadway. While appearing in London, she was spotted by impresario Florenz Ziegfeld, who brought her to America as his common-law wife. From 1896 through ...

* Invincible Quartette *

Ada Jones Ada Jane Jones (June 1, 1873 – May 2, 1922) was an English-American popular singer who made her first recordings in 1893 on Edison cylinders. She is among the earliest female singers to be recorded. Biography She was born in Lancashire, UK, ...

* Giuseppe Li Puma * Charles P. Lowe *

Billy Murray (singer) William Thomas Murray (May 25, 1877 – August 17, 1954) was one of the most popular singers in the United States in the early 20th century. While he received star billing in vaudeville, he was best known for his prolific work in the recording ...

* J.W. Myers * Vess L. Ossman *

Steve Porter (singer) Stephen Carl Porter (1864 – January 13, 1946) was an American pioneer recording artist, who recorded prolifically for numerous recording companies in the 1890s and early 1900s. He was also an entrepreneur who helped establish the recording ...

* Dan W. Quinn * Regimental Band of the Republic * Royal Hawaiian Troubadours * Len Spencer * Frank C. Stanley *

Harry Tally Harry Lee Tally (June 30, 1866 – August 16, 1939) was an American tenor singer of popular songs, who recorded between 1902 and 1917. Biography He was born in Memphis, Tennessee, and began performing in a popular vaudeville act, the Empire ...

* George P. Watson

Print references

* ''American Record Label Book'', Brian Rust, Da Capo, 1984.

References

External links

American Record Company on Shellac.org
{{Authority control American record labels Record labels established in 1904 Record labels disestablished in 1906 Defunct record labels of the United States Defunct companies based in Massachusetts 1904 establishments in Massachusetts 1906 disestablishments in Massachusetts Entertainment companies of the United States