The Gray Audograph was a dictation machine format introduced in 1945. It recorded sound by pressing grooves into soft

vinyl Vinyl may refer to: Chemistry * Polyvinyl chloride (PVC), a particular vinyl polymer * Vinyl cation, a type of carbocation * Vinyl group, a broad class of organic molecules in chemistry * Vinyl polymer, a group of polymers derived from vinyl ...

discs, like the competing, but incompatible,

SoundScriber SoundScriber is a dictation machine introduced in 1945 by The SoundScriber Corp. (New Haven). It records sound with a groove embossed into soft vinyl discs with a stylus. by Soundscriber's chief engineer, has technical details of the machines Si ...

. It was manufactured by the Gray Manufacturing Company of

Hartford, Connecticut Hartford is the capital city of the U.S. state of Connecticut. It was the seat of Hartford County until Connecticut disbanded county government in 1960. It is the core city in the Greater Hartford metropolitan area. Census estimates since t ...

, in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

. The Audograph recorded on thin vinyl discs, recording from the inside to the outside, the opposite of conventional

gramophone record 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 ne ...

s. Unlike conventional records, the disc was driven by a surface-mounted wheel. This meant that its recording and playback speed decreased toward the edge of the disc (like the

Compact Disc The compact disc (CD) is a digital optical disc data storage format that was co-developed by Philips and Sony to store and play digital audio recordings. In August 1982, the first compact disc was manufactured. It was then released in O ...

and other digital formats), to keep a more constant linear velocity and to improve playing time. Along with a Dictabelt sound recorder, an Audograph captured sounds recorded at the time of the

John F. Kennedy assassination John F. Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States, was assassinated on Friday, November 22, 1963, at 12:30 p.m. CST in Dallas, Texas, while riding in a presidential motorcade through Dealey Plaza. Kennedy was in the vehicle with ...

that were reviewed by the United States House Select Committee on Assassinations. In 1950, Gray began to make a variant of the Audograph for

AT&T AT&T Inc. is an American multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered at Whitacre Tower in Downtown Dallas, Texas. It is the world's largest telecommunications company by revenue and the third largest provider of mobile ...

, known as the Peatrophone; however, due to what at the time were the high costs of renting and installing the machine, it served only a niche market.

References

External links

Restoring Gray Audograph recordings

Image of Audograph catalog
Audiovisual introductions in 1945 Audio storage 1945 in technology Products introduced in 1945 {{Product-stub