Making the Perfect Record: From Inscription to Impression in Early Magnetic RecordingMain MenuAboutAbstract for “Making the Perfect Record,” American Literature 85.4 (December 2013), http://dx.doi.org/10.1215/00029831-2370230, Duke U PIntroductionIntroduction to Making the Perfect Record: From Inscription to Impression in Early Magnetic RecordingNotesNotes for “Making the Perfect Record,” American Literature 85.4 (December 2013), http://dx.doi.org/10.1215/00029831-2370230, Duke U PMediaMedia for “Making the Perfect Record,” American Literature 85.4 (December 2013), http://dx.doi.org/10.1215/00029831-2370230, Duke U PAcknowledgmentsAcknowledgments for “Making the Perfect Record,” American Literature 85.4 (December 2013), http://dx.doi.org/10.1215/00029831-2370230, Duke U PTechnical InformationTechnical Information for “Making the Perfect Record,” American Literature 85.4 (December 2013), http://dx.doi.org/10.1215/00029831-2370230, Duke U PReferencesReferences for “Making the Perfect Record,” American Literature 85.4 (December 2013), http://dx.doi.org/10.1215/00029831-2370230, Duke U PJentery Sayersbecbfb529bffcfafdfad6920ed57b30ccdca5339This essay is part of the “New Media” special issue of American Literature (volume 85, number 4, December 2013). See http://dx.doi.org/10.1215/00029831-2370230. Version 1 of the site is (c) 2013 by Duke University Press.
Reconstruction of Edison's Menlo Park Laboratory
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12013-10-18T12:58:57-07:00Responding to Edison’s Noise13Smith Was Prompted to Develop Magnetic Recording after Visiting Edison’s Menlo Park Laboratoryplain2014-01-01T15:10:13-08:00In the history of technologies before and after 1888, a drive toward the abstraction and standardization of both information and perception is certainly nothing novel. However, what makes the case of early magnetic recording unique is that Oberlin Smith bundled that abstraction and standardization with a critique of mechanical noise, which abraded cultured ears as it revealed technical flaws. One such flaw was the friction between a needle and groove caused during the playback of mechanically recorded sound inscribed on tinfoil. As magnetic audio historian Mark H. Clark notes in “The Magnetic Recording of Sound,” Oberlin Smith visited Thomas Edison’s Menlo Park laboratory in early 1878, ten years prior to his publication in Electrical World and just after Edison patented the cylinder phonograph (1999c, 7).
While examining Edison’s new device, Smith was struck by a scratchy noise generated during playback. It was a noise that mechanical recordings simply could not avoid, and it offended Smith’s ears. As a response, he proposed magnetic recording, where no audible, physical contact would be made between the storage medium (for example, thread) and the playback mechanism (for example, an electromagnet).
