You young ‘ns have probably only seen the word “phonograph” in history books. Conventional wisdom has it that on this date in 1877 Thomas Alva Edison publicly introduced the cylinder phonograph. It is not known the precise date Mr. Edison spoke the first verse of “Mary had a little lamb” into the contraption, but the American Memory Project at the Library of Congress puts the date somewhere August 12th and December 24th. We’ll go with the flow and say it’s today.
The New York Times ran a commentary on November 28 of that year stating that with the invention of the telegraph, telephone and now the phonograph “electricians had lost all self-restraint.” On the horizon was the wireless telegraph, the use of which could have dire consequences: “A mother, sitting in the nursery with her baby in her arms, may be struck by a violent speech by Wendell Phillips, and sustain a fatal injury.” “The aerial electrical current will be constantly full of Congressional speeches…which will be liable at any moment to…penetrate our houses.” Sounds very familiar.