10.1

Hostess, the Rock-Ola Mystic Music System //Source(s): Telephone Collecting, Seven Decades of Design (With Price Guide) by Kate E. Dooner 1993 Schiffer Publishing Company, 77 Lower Valley Road, Atgen, Pennsylvania 19810 ISBN 0-88740-489-8// (((A handsomely produced outsized paperback with dozens of chop-licking glossy photographs of extinct telephone models and associated collectible ephemera.))) page 95 "MULTIPHONES "The 'multiphone' was created in 1939 by Kenneth C. Shyvers and his wife, Lois. They were operators of 'juke' boxes who found that 'multiphones' allowed a greater number of songs to be played. Whereas juke boxes played only 20 selections, the 'multiphone' could play up to 170 songs. "'Multiphones' came to be installed in cafes and taverns in each booth or along the bar. The system required two leased telephone lines, one for the 'multiphones' and the other for the loudspeakers on the wall where the music played. The wired music system worked by inserting money, a nickel originally and later a dime. A feminine voice asked for your song number, and you responded. Soon you were listening to the music from the loudspeakers on the wall, which was connected to a central, record playing station. "Eventually, juke boxes were remodelled to play 180 tunes on 45 rpm records. The 'multiphone' system could not compete with them economically, and the system went out of business in 1959." (((Page 103 features two handsome illustrations of multiphone technology. The first is a Shyvers Multiphone, a hefty, towering gadget in stylish Art Deco cast aluminum. It has a speaker-grille in the bottom, a coin-slot for dimes, and what appears to be a rotating printed menu of "new releases." The second device is a "Phonette Melody Lane" from the Personal Music Corporation of Newark, New Jersey. A modest device with a squat rectangular grille, it declares in embossed lettering: "INSERT 1 TO 6 NICKELS. EACH NICKEL PLAYS THE EQUIVALENT OF TWO RECORDS. THIS MACHINE CAN BE HEARD IN YOUR IMMEDIATE AREA ONLY."))) //Source(s): American Jukebox, the Classic Years by Vincent Lynch, photography by Kaz Tsuruta, Chronicle Books, San// //Francisco 1990// ISBN 0-87701-722-0, ISBN 0-87701-678-X paperback (((A lavishly illustrated work of eerie beauty which showcases an audacious twentieth-century mix of industrial design, American popular culture and pure swaggering kitsch. Surely "Bakelite Psychedelia" could find no higher expression that the 1941 Rock-Ola Spectravox.))) "Manufacturers continued to experiment with new ways to deliver music to patrons. In 1939, AMI introduced the Automatic Hostess telephone system and in 1941 Rock-Ola invented the Mystic Music System. Both were jukeboxes in every way except that there was no phonograph mechanism. After depositing a coin, the patron spoke into a microphone to an operator who would play the selection; the music returned over the phone lines to the speaker. The systems proved unsuccessful for AMI and Rock-Ola, but the idea worked for the Shyver Multiphone Co., which operated in Seattle, Tacoma, and Olympia Washington, from 1939 to 1959." A cousin medium to the telephone jukebox is very much alive today, though it is vastly more expensive, much smaller in variety, is limited to one person, and offers mere samples of songs. //Source(s): WIRED magazine June 1996 issue// page 167 "MUSIC ACCESS. If you'd like to hear excerpts from these discs, call 900-454-3277 (95 cents per minute). Touch tone required. US only. Under 18? Get parent's permission. When prompted: Enter access code (under the name of the artist). Music controls: 3 = Fast forward, 4=Louder, 5=Softer, * = Exit music/bypass most prompts.A charge of 95 cents per minute will appear on your phone bill. An average call is about 2.5 minutes."
 * Dead medium: Telephonic Jukeboxes: The Shyvers Multiphone, the Phonette Melody Lane, the AMI Automatic**
 * From: bruces@fringeware.com Bruce Sterling**