My brother recently passed away, we found 5 reels in his basement, i knew what they were. I bought a Webster Chicago Model 18 off ebay, the machine works flawless. The 70 year old recordings are of my father and his brothers and sisters singing and telling stories, we are all very excited, this is better than finding gold.

I love the little bobbing spindle that ensures the wire is evenly distributed across the width of the roll.

This was a fabulous demonstration. And a trip back in time. The fact that they are still playable at all is amazing. The audio quality is still, amazing. Your, refurbishing and restoration work is, amazing. Bravo, Sir. It's guys like you preserve history like this.. Now permanently digitized on the Internet. These people are long gone. Their voices live on. They could have never imagined it.. Isn't that amazing history? Thank you for this lovely demonstration. It took quite a bit of work. Quite a bit of time. Quite a bit of thought. And so eloquently done. And I'm just a stupid American. And look at what you got. I would think that was from wartime or just postwar time, communications. That was the only way to do that. Back then. And it still plays, today. Without any scratches. It's strange hearing it without any scratches. Like it was recorded, yesterday. Yesteryear. Yesterday Kate, scores. A really long time ago. From a Bygone Era. You have preserved, so well. What a museum piece. That still works beautifully. Because of you. Personally I was into Recorders. But the ones that used the plastic tape. I worked for one of the legendary companies in the US that made them. I made the best ones. Scully. But I also had dealings with Ampex, 3M and MCI. I also contributed to. I never imagined myself ever doing this. I only liked using them. I never expected to be working for them or in charge. What a ride. And they just keep going round and round. I built them so well. But only the mylar/polyester tapes played today. The original acetate tapes have all turned to, dust. If they did not get copied and/or digitized, early on. They are gone, forever. Into the realm of time and space. Gone forever. We will miss them, dearly. As they were much like these wire recordings. From my childhood. Nearly 70 years ago. But I did get to some of them. Before the death of my father. To present them to him on CD. Back in 2000 just prior to his passing. I got to those. I didn't get to all of the musical ones. Damn. They were of my parents, Performing across Europe. If I have any chance of recovery of those whatsoever? They will only be on a consumer machine. With, No Hold Back Tension. Virtually, none. And virtually no take-up, tension. It might only be a waste basket dump. Of one single chance of recovery. But if it is that fragile? Tears will make it all sticky. I will likely never get to them. As I dehydrate and disappear, in time. RemyRAD

I restore old radios and whatnot as a hobby. This is absolutely fascinating. It is so very rare to get a look into the history of the piece that you're working with. Amazing find!

I bought one of these wire recorders off eBay. A little different with a slant front panel. Same transport as yours. I had to restore the electronics with new capacitors. Unfortunately the reels of wire that came with it only had recordings from radio stations. No family chats. It’s still interesting to hear what was on the radio in the early 50’s. These are real time machines. Those electronic letters and remembrances brought a tear to my eye.

After the war, my uncle settled in CA. He sent my grandparents a machine so that they could hear my uncle’s stories. We met his new wife and eventually kids through the recordings and he met all of us the same way. Eventually we all were able to afford travel.

Well done on the restoration! The sound quality is so good, better than some tapes that I've heard from newer machines.

Wow.... unexpectedly good sound quality!

This is so exciting! Wow! Tha Adams family... the son, the pilot, the music, the drama., the laughter.. Cool! It's such a beautiful looking machine Bruce. Well done you on getting it up and running.

Amazing audio quality, I've heard another demo that was absolutely hopeless, so I was rather surprised to hear this one

Well, this was just the highlight of my day. Thank you.

This is the best sounding machine I’ve heard. Granted I’ve only ever heard them through KZfaq, but this really is the best sounding one I’ve heard. I’m fascinated by old audio technologies that might hold information about and voices from the past. Like the other poster I think you should track them down if you could and let them hear what their grandparents etc sounded like. Every few months I have a trawl through YT to see if there are any more wire recordings I can listen to, and I’m glad I found this one. Thank you so much for uploading this material.

That’s so cool! I’ve never seen one of those devices before, let alone heard it played back. It sounded like it was a bit of fun for them to record themselves, like we used to do as kids with cassette tapes.

Great to hear the new recordings.

this is amazing! Nice video!

A very historically important man! I've been rewatching the MISSION IMPOSSIBLE TV show with friend's and theres an episode where a secret wire recording is disguised and then used as fishing wire

that was really NEAT

This is amazing 👏

Wonderful discoveries ! Technological wizard skills revealing delightful historical archives.Bet the descendants of the Adam family would be delighted to discover your work !

Spectacular.

Awesome. I've seen one of the at a museum but never in action. It was also a Webster-Chicago.

That rewind caught me so off guard wow :')

I wonder if this is your John Adams? nla.gov.au/nla.news-article76224471 Searching Ancestry website I have found John & Irayna Hollosy Adams lived at 141A Kilby Rd Kew in 1954, in 1972 they had moved 2 doors along to 145 Kilby Rd - occupation Air Pilot.John 1913-1995 and Irayna Hollosy (died Wheelers Hill -2004) were married in Montreal in 1949. The Ancestry site details a private living son (perhaps John) but no daughter. I will message the Ancestry profile that has the Adams in their tree & direct them to this fascinating time capsule.

Thanks for sharing these stories. Have you tried to digitize the recordings? What equipment would you need to do this? Thanks!

I remember seeing a video of a vintage wire recording from 1969 of top 40 radio classic, psychedelic and garage rock.

Mesmerising. Wouldn't it be amazing if you could trace the current generation of Adamses to show them those voices.

Man this stuff is so fascinating. I wonder how far the medium could be pushed with modern technology for microphones and other signal processing. What does the frequency response look like for the wire, and what’s the dynamic range?

I have a Webster chicago wire recorder too, A bit different model than yours, mine is like the suitcase model that is flatter and with a carry handle. according to the recordings I found on the reels I got it was used by a band playing music and they recorded various stuff when they practiced. pretty nice story to find when you know what it was for in way in the past. If you read this I would like to ask you how deep the wire groove is in your audio head. I think mine is a bit too deep and any minimal defect on the wire just catches it and it may snap. it would be nice to see how a different head looks in close up to get a comparison. But I think mine was used a lot

I have a bunch of the reels too I bought a broken wire recorder ns it came wth a box of reels

The speed problem might be due to the wire being recorded on the opposite line frequency of what you have there. If you have 50hz ac and it was recorded on 60hz ac then the recording would be slower

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Are there surviving Adams family members?

You can use an 12 volt to 120 volt 60hz inverter than you can connect on an 12 volt battery or power supply.

Where is The George Hotel recordings?

How come you have it plugged into a transformer