Can you name this car?

[Big Beat]

As a phonograph collector, a few tips... The machine in the famous Victor trademark that the dog Nipper is listening to is NOT a Victrola. It is a Victor model B from 1896, with a very obvious external horn. The Victrola was a line of machines with an INTERNAL horn that Victor introduced in 1906. The external horn was considered too intrusive to display in a fashionable home, plus everything was exposed to dust. So a new type of machine was invented with a horn folded inside the cabinet and a lid to cover the turntable when not in use. This proved very popular and the name Victrola became generic for any such machine. But NOT for an older external horn phonograph. Also, early Victrolas were too big to be easily portable, even the tabletop models. The first truly portable "suitcase" type Victrola was the model VV-50, introduced in 1921. Taking a Victrola to a picnic in the trunk of a car became very popular in the early 1920s, not before that. Hope this helps. 

Edited February 21, 2021 by Big Beat (see edit history)

[padgett]

Trying to limit my verbiage but +1 to what Big said, painting was done in 1896 and models V- were external horn Victors and VV- was internal horn Victor Victrola (plus a few early VTLAs). The Radio Corporation of America bought the Victor Talking Machine Company in 1929.

 

Car radios dated from the early 20s but were cumbersome affairs.

 

Don't get me started on Armstrong & FM

[rocketraider]

On 2/19/2021 at 1:23 PM, debster said:

Sorry. No dead body. Yet. This is a love story. 😉 

But a lot of times love stories cause dead bodies... oh, this isn't a love triangle.

 

🙃

[8E45E]

12 hours ago, padgett said:

Trying to limit my verbiage but +1 to what Big said, painting was done in 1896 and models V- were external horn Victors and VV- was internal horn Victor Victrola (plus a few early VTLAs). The Radio Corporation of America bought the Victor Talking Machine Company in 1929.

 

Car radios dated from the early 20s but were cumbersome affairs.

 

Don't get me started on Armstrong & FM

In the U.K., they were marketed as His Master's Voice, or 'HMV' for short, including car radios made for Rolls-Royce, and some others.

 

Craig

[Flivverking]

Maybe this salesman in your novel can just be hard on cars, not a very good driver and ignores the maintenace required (pactically daily) for a car of a circa 1920 that even back then can easily be driven 50 to 100 miles a day by a traveling huckster.

Note, every mid or lower price car maker had there share of random lemmons,even of models with decent reps..just like today .You don't need a specific make car to have a reason for chronic repairs.

 

Common issues like broken rear axles, broken motor mounts,suspension breakage,bent front axle,dirty fuel and carb clogging problems. plus ignition troubles were big on repair lists,not to mention tire blow outs.

 

[60FlatTop]

Here is a phonograph box cover from about 1910.

 

My house dates to 1853 originally built by the King family. The last King died and my family bought the house in 1949. I was one year old. A few years ago we turned the original small bathroom into a laundry room and repurposed an extra bedroom into a fairly large bathroom.

The new bathroom is in the wing section. It is the classic gable wing style farmhouse. In the attic there was evidence of a chimney hole covered and some lumpy shadows under the wall paper. Doing a careful demo we found the stenciled box lid pictured and the opposite side with shipping details to Mrs. King at our address. It came from Rochester, about 25 miles away, by train to our village depot.

Nice hidden treasure from the earliest Model T days.

Edited February 25, 2021 by 60FlatTop (see edit history)

[8E45E]

22 hours ago, 60FlatTop said:

Here is a phonograph box cover from about 1910.

 

My house dates to 1853 originally built by the King family.  Doing a careful demo we found the stenciled box lid pictured and the opposite side with shipping details to Mrs. King at our address. It came from Rochester, about 25 miles away, by train to our village depot.

Nice hidden treasure from the earliest Model T days.

One must wonder what is behind the walls of many of these old houses, just waiting to reveal their inner secrets.

 

Several years ago, when I had a paper route, a customer showed me some old 1912 newspapers that were used for insulation in the upper gable area when he renovated.  And I have heard many stories since then of old newspaper found intact inside walls of older homes.

 

Craig

[TAKerry]

I have been a contractor for over 40 years. My specialty is historic renovations, I regularily work on 150 yr old+ homes. I have yet to find a 'treasure'. 

[padgett]

Before WWII there was not much here.

[John_S_in_Penna]

Notice that Debster, the original poster, hasn't

been back since the day of her first posting.

I hope she's going to be helped by our contributions;

but is there any point of continuing the thread and

taking it off track?

[60FlatTop]

On 2/19/2021 at 9:29 AM, debster said:

one of the characters is a (novice and not very good) auto mechanic.

 

Must be she found two pages of what she was looking for.

[jeff_a]

....

Here's a candidate that sold from a museum collection in Philly: 1922 Peerless Opera Coupe. A $3,500 car, very imposing, over 7 feet at the roofline. They were reliable cars, though the owner said there are some intricate workings in the valve mechanisms of his 332 cubic inch "V-Type Eight"[aluminum crankcase, transmission case, oil pan] Peerless engine. Split seats in front, room for two in back seat + an upholstered case for your top hat, and a built-in trunk accessible by a lid on the rear deck.

 

The 282-page hardcover book PEERLESS AUTOMOBILES IN THE BRASS ERA: 1900-1915 that came out last year has a 16-page Appendix listing all the models over the years 1900-1932, and it shows 4-passenger coupes for the 4 years preceding 1922. I don't really know if they were along the lines of the car above, or not.  

Edited February 28, 2021 by jeff_a (see edit history)

[jeff_a]

Here's an artist's impression of about the same thing...probably an '18 or '19. You can never have too interesting a frontspiece to your book. Something like this will draw the reader in a little to your romance.

Edited March 1, 2021 by jeff_a (see edit history)