ABSTRACT
At a family event with speeches in the 1930s the head of the house switches on the wireless and opens the gramophone with the recording equipment, takes out a blank lacquer record from its sleeve, places it on the turntable and fixes it using a large nut with a left-hand thread. He takes a bottle of lubricating liquid and distributes some on the blank with an already shiny surface with a wad of cotton wool. He takes a cutting needle, which has a funny, scooplike shape, from a small packet and places it carefully in the hole of the cutterhead. He swings the threaded rod carrying the cutterhead across the record so that it locks to the centre spindle of the turntable. He takes a microphone, places it in its sprung holder in front of the next speaker and connects it to the wireless set (see Figure 2.1).2
