• Free Orchestral Music
• Regina Orchestral 27 Music Box For Sale

Regina orchestral 27' disc music box No. 21465, shipped to San Francisco retailer Sherman Clay & Co., on January 6, 1897, executed in mahogany, having a gallery cornice, above a single door case with an inset round glass panel, flanked by reeded and turned pilasters, including (13) 27' pierced metal disks, retains Sherman, Clay & Co., retailers plaque, 79'h x 43'w x 17'd.

Beginning in the 1880’s, interest in music boxes was developing in America. The Regina Music Box Comapny of Rahway, New Jersey, made many kinds of music boxes but the most popular were the boxes that played interchangeable metal disks. Regina was the largest American manufacturer of music boxes and in time, Wurlitzer became the largest single sales outlet for Regina.Around 1896, Wurlitzer convinced Regina to equip music boxes with coin slots for commerical applications. The 27' diameter Orchestral Corona model would play the choice of one tune for a nickel giving the company insight into the potential for coin-operated music.This Regina Music Box was made in 1898 and classified as an 'idiophone'. The idiophone instruments produced sound by vibrating objects set to a specific pitch. The first disks were made of zinc, but the projections kept breaking off, so the disks were then made from brass or steel. Some disks were even coated with copper!

Free Orchestral Music

Regina Orchestral 27 Music Box For Sale

Regina Music Box Photos & History & View Old Regina Music Box Co. PhotosPlease click HereThe Regina Music Box Company Photos and HistoryI was very fortunate years ago to acquire The Regina Music Box Company'sphoto negatives,these are a few of the photos developed from them. Please Enjoy,Al MeekinsT he ReginaMusic Box Company story begins in Gohis, Germany in 1885 at the Symphonionmusic box Co. When the disc playing music box wasintroduced. Sensing that their boss was on to a good thing-and figuringthey could make a better music box - two Symphonion employees, GustaveBrachhausen and Paul Reissner, left the company in 1889 to set up thereown firm, Polyphon, in nearby Leipzig. It wasn't long before they wereoutselling their former employer.

A very steep increase in tariffs ongoods imported to the United States, enacted in 1890, made it more cost-effective for Polyphonto set up shop here rather than export its music boxes from Germany.ReginaMusic Box Co. President Gustave Adolf Brachhausen Born Saxony Germany 1860This Photo 1892In 1894, Brachhausen officially inauguratedThe Regina music box Company which would soon become an entity independentof Polyphone. By the time The Regina music box Co. Was founded, themusic box industry had already made great strides-evolving from musicboxes that contained a single cylinder dotted with metal pins to thosewith Interchangeable cylinders and, eventually, to those that playedinterchangeable discs, making it possible to tailor the music to suit anyoccasion.The Regina music box Company basically followed the industrystandard, tweaked it and executed it better than its competitors.

Among theRegina music boxes more significant improvements were the introduction ofstronger spring-wound motors that could play for a longer time before theyrequired rewinding and the placement of the machine's sounding board on thetop to increase volume called a short bedplate. Gustave Brachhausen is in the left front row with the hatonMore than 100 years ago the Regina Music Box Company was regarded asAmericas finest music box maker. In later generations, Regina became betterknown for manufacturing vacuum cleaners but the company's original goal wasto fill daily life with music - and for a time it was very successful indoing so. At the turn of the last century, The Regina music box company'ssales grossed about $2 million a year at a time when a loaf of bread was 1cent and a bank teller made about 7 dollars a week.

A costly purchase, in1900 the least expensive 8 inch disc size Regina music box was $12 - about$300. In present-day figures. Nevertheless plenty of households owned aRegina music box.A Wagon Full of Crated Regina Music Boxes Headed For the Rahway NJTrain Station,Then on by Freight Train To Lyon & Healy Music Showrooms In Chicago.The Regina music box Company produced more than 100,000 musicboxes between 1892 and 1920.

Only a relatively small number of Regina musicboxes have survived 2 world wars scrap metal drives and other forms ofelimination.The Regina Music Box Factory 1895The Regina Factory aerial view 1947.