Toasty Warm on a Cold Winter’s Night

 

QUESTION: Recently while browsing in an antique shop, I came upon a strange-looking object. It appeared to be made of clay in the shape of a short log and had what looked like a hole on top in which rested a stopper. Both ends were closed and rounded, with a chunky knob protruding from the front end. The antiques dealer told me it was a hot water bottle. The only hot water bottles I know of are the ones made of rubber. Can you tell me more about this object?

ANSWER: The strange object is indeed a hot water bottle. Few things compare to the cozy warmth provided by a hot water bottle. Before the invention of the rubber hot water bottle, most people used one made of stoneware. Though these were heavy and clunky, they served the purpose.

Most people had one hot water bottle in the house. Made of stoneware, a white clay fired at a high temperature and glazed so that it resembled polished stone, so most people called it just a “stone.” However, the Scottish children saw a bit of whimsy in them, believing that they looked like a little pig, so they coined the name “Bed Pig.” Actually, the name “pig” isn’t related to pigs at all. It's a Scottish word for a round pot.

The seals on these bottles weren’t very good, so naturally people used them only when it was bitterly cold. Often the stone cap would be replaced with a cork to seal in the hot water. Though they were heavy, they could still crack and leak, which would burn whoever was in bed and make the bed wet.

Some mothers believed that it was healthy to get into a cold bed. In winter it was usually very cold in bed, as most people didn’t light fires in their bedrooms for fear of falling asleep with the fire going. Also, windows had single glazing, not like the multiple glazing of those today. It wasn’t uncommon for people to wake up to ice on the insides of their windows from frozen condensation.

Stoneware hot water bottles had been around since the early 19th century and perhaps before. The idea was to fill them with hot water, close the stopper securely and stand them in a bed, upright, on their small flat ends so that the sheets and blankets formed a tent-like structure over them. The peak of the '”ent” was the special feature of the rounded knob opposite the flat end, which also served as a carrying handle. One of the primary manufacturers of stoneware hot water bottles was Langley Ware of England.

People believed that using the hot water bottle this way heated more of the bed, but it was an unstable arrangement and the “tent” would have been quite small, as even with the knob to give extra height, the hot water bottle, itself, stood only about a foot tall. To make sure the entire bed warmed up, users would move them around in the bed periodically for an hour or two before climbing into bed.

Large stoneware hot water bottle also served as a foot warmer. The stoneware hot water bottle was cylindrical but also had a flat side. Ladies would fill the bottle with hot water and lay it on its side on the floor in front of a chair by the fire. Since they wore long dresses, they could take off their shoes and place their feet on the rounded top of the bottle, then pull the skirt of their dress over their feet to hide them. This way no one could see that they had taken off their shoes and were warming their feet. They often took these bottles with them in the carriage when the weather was very cold, doing much the same thing as they did in their parlors.

Hot water was also used in glass or ceramic pots that sealed in the hot water with a cork. Not many glass hot water bottles survived but the ceramic containers continued in production for many years well into the 20th century.

Because they were mass produced and very robust, many stoneware hot water bottles have survived, so their antique value isn’t a lot. But many can still be used today and will be for years to come to keep people warm and toasty on a cold winter’s night.

To read more articles on antiques, please visit the Antiques Articles section of my Web site.  And to stay up to the minute on antiques and collectibles, please join the over 50,000 readers by following my free online magazine, #TheAntiquesAlmanac. Learn more about "Sacred Artifacts" in the 2025 Holiday Edition, online now. And to read daily posts about unique objects from the past and their histories, like the #Antiques and More Collection on Facebook.

Away in a Manger

 

QUESTION: My grandfather left me a beautiful creche which he said his father brought over from Germany in the late 19th century. Can you tell me anything about this and if it is, in fact, German?

ANSWER: You, indeed, have a German creche. From its design, I’d say it dates from the 1890s, possibly a bit before. During the 17th century, Nativity scenes, promoted by the Capuchin, Jesuit and Franciscan orders, gained in popularity as a way for common people to express their joy during the Christmas season.

Nativity scenes gained popularity in the 17th century, promoted by the Capuchin, Jesuit and Franciscan orders. By the 18th century, three centers of crèche culture had emerged—Naples, Italy, Provence, France, and southern Germany and Austria.

Over the years, the Nativity has been portrayed in many ways. In America, the most popular form is the crèche, a word meaning "manger" or "crib" in French. Carved from wood—although some makers use ceramics, glass, straw, fabric, or even plastic—and painted, a crèche usually depicts the entire Nativity scene, including the manger, a star, angels, shepherds, kings and the Holy Family. Although most are miniature in scale, a few church crèches are almost life-size.

Although he didn’t originate the idea, historians credit St. Francis of Assisi with popularizing the Nativity scene. From Italy, the idea spread north across the Alps and finally came to the U.S. with German settlers.

Supposedly, a rich man, Giovanni Vellita, approached St. Francis in December, 1223, asking how he could serve God. St. Francis told him to build a simple, little stable just outside Assisi in the cave at Greccio. This was a time when the average man learned about his faith from the plays he watched, the songs he heard, and the art that lined the walls of the churches.

Much of the celebration of Christmas occurred in churches for a long time. The common worker, much less the very poor, weren’t given much of a place in these celebrations. St. Francis wanted to give the poor people a chance to celebrate. And so the story goes, as midnight approached that Christmas Eve, a great procession wound its way out of Assisi and up the hill to Greccio. Everyone came carrying candles to this new manger they had built for the Holy Child. They celebrated mass that night. Surrounded by an ox and a donkey and by the people of Assisi, all playing the parts of the shepherds and folk of Bethlehem.

Long after St. Francis died, the people of Italy continued to build stables for the Christ Child. Among wealthy Italian families, the simple manger became something incredibly magnificent, the grand Italian Presepio. Naples became the center of the biggest presepi workshops. By the 18th century, these crèches took up whole rooms, indeed, sometimes whole floors of great homes. People traveled from villa to villa to visit and admire these incredible displays, which often took months and a great deal of money to complete.

Sancta Maria Ad Praesepe, later to become the Basilica Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome, contains the first recorded free standing set of creche figures, sculpted from stone by Amolfo Di Cambio in 1282. For some time after, nearly all the creches made were life-sized stone or wood. Those in Tyrolean churches had statues with elaborate Baroque costumes. At the same time, inexpensive Nativity scenes made out of painted paper became available to those who couldn’t afford carved figures.

Artisans construct crèches or Nativity sets from a variety of materials. The characters can be carved from wood, formed from wax, papier-mache, or clay, or hand painted on cardboard. They stand in or in front of buildings, ranging from Alpine stables and guest houses to romantic Roman ruins. Others have Middle Eastern-style structures with minarets and domes.

But the best—elaborate and intricately carved figures of wood—came from Bavaria. Their creators stained them with paint to make them lifelike. German creches , often called krippen, can also be made of cast metal, cast painted plaster, cardboard with painted or printed artwork, turned wood or clay. Each Christmas, in scenes made up of rocks, branches, evergreens and moss collected in the woods by the family’s children just before the holiday, the krippe is reborn. Christmas morning finds these scenes around the base of the family’s Christmas tree in what’s called a putz or tree yard.

For many, collecting crèches is an act of faith. Their crèches provide an expression of their Christianity. Mormons are great collectors of crèches. Creating a Nativity scene in a church has been a long-standing tradition among Catholics And there has been increasing interest in collecting Nativity sets among Protestants.

But mostly, people collect crèches because they’re personal, a reflection of intimate family life. They’re about humanity, not religious dogma or ritual. Moving Nativity sets from the church to the home has made them a popular art form.

Among collectible creches, those hardest to find today are those predating World War II.  Adolf Hitler had many of the German molds for creche figures destroyed. At the time, Germany was the premiere maker of creches. 

Nativity sets and crèches vary in value, from some worth over $1,100 to others worth just $5. But for many collectors, their value is intrinsic. They’re also easy to find and buy, which makes them fun to collect. At one point, the Ruby Lane site on the Internet had no less then 300 sets for sale.

To read more articles on antiques, please visit the Antiques Articles section of my Web site.  And to stay up to the minute on antiques and collectibles, please join the over 50,000 readers by following my free online magazine, #TheAntiquesAlmanac. Learn more about "Sacred Artifacts" in the 2025 Holiday Edition, online now. And to read daily posts about unique objects from the past and their histories, like the #Antiques and More Collection on Facebook.

An Unlikely Result of the Black Death

 

QUESTION: My family is German by descent. And being so, my grandfather assembled a collection of German beer steins. He left them to me. Rather then just have them sit on a shelf, I’d like to grow the collection. I don’t know anything about antique or even vintage steins and would like to know more before I purchase additional ones. How did steins originate? When were the first ones produced? And how can I tell if a stein has value? 

ANSWER: Those are all good questions. I’m glad to see that you’re interested in curating your grandfather’s collection rather then just packing the steins away or selling them off. 

Believe it or not, German beer steins have a very unlikely and surreal origin. Originally, the Germans produced beer steins to combat health issues that triggered the Bubonic Plague, also known as the Black Death which killed over 25 millions Europeans. Around the same time, hoards of flies began invading central Europe in the late 1400s. The fly invasion, combined with the plague, resulted in Germany passing sanitary laws that required all food and beverage containers to have lids to protect people from the insects.

Strict laws enforcing sanitation on the ingredients, transport, and quality of beer led to a great improvement in the taste of German beer. This made men value beer steins, thus wanting to own their own unique steins. The beer stein became a status symbol and display piece for German families each displaying its family crest.

Beer steins are a popular symbol for both Germany and beer. They come in all kinds of shapes, sizes, and materials, including earthenware, metal, pewter, wood, ivory, ceramic, porcelain, crystal, creamware, silver, and glass. Most have handles, a hinged lid and are decorated or hand-painted.

The decorative elements of beer steins may represent traditional motifs, regalia, a coat of arms, or depict a person’s occupation. Some are embellished with three-dimensional artwork and touch on a theme. You may also find a collectible series of beer steins with themed artwork or antique steins with engraved dates to commemorate a special occasion.

The earliest antique German beer steins date to the 14th century, a time when earthenware was being improved, Germany was making new and improved brews, and Europe was ravaged with the bubonic plague.

From the 14th to the 17th centuries, German potters added salt, cobalt oxide blue, manganese oxide purple, and chocolate salt glaze to their steins. To go beyond simple decoration, they applied relief decorative shields, as well as historical, figurative, and Biblical scenes.

Beer steins evolved as a result of the laws passed in several German principalities stating that covers had to be on all beverage and food containers. The laws, and others related to sanitary conditions, were in reaction to the fear that a recurrence of the bubonic plague, also called the Black Death, would be caused by several invasions of flies throughout Central Europe in the mid to late fifteenth century. Up until that time, most common folk drank beer from mugs made of porous earthenware or wood. The well-to-do and upper class drank from glass, pewter or silver vessels, called beakers or tankards.

Stein is a shortened version of the word steinzeug krug, which means stoneware, tankard, or jug in German. A stein was just one of a variety of beer drinking vessels. The word transformed into staene, meaning jug in Old English. The English version, stein, appeared in 1855. In common usage, stein referred to any beer vessel with a hinged lid and handle.

Germans originally drank beer in mugs, but once the sanitary laws passed, these mugs came with a hinged lid with a thumblift. This ensured the mug could not only stay covered but could also be used to drink out of using only one hand using the thumblift.

Once the 16th century began, regulations regarding the quality and transportation of German beer resulted in better tasting beer and a variety of steins. The improved beer brought patrons to taverns, as well as the desire to own a personal stein.

By the mid-17th century, German beer and stoneware beer steins were in high demand. The elite members of the German society wanted elaborately decorated steins made of silver, pewter, or glass which were made in Bavaria, Koblenz and Koln.

As personal steins became more popular, Germans wanted durable but inexpensive containers out of which to drink their clean beer. Stein makers began searching for better materials. Eventually, they created stoneware which proved to be a superior material that was chip-resistant and non-porous. It was the perfect component for a container that needed to meet sanitary conditions.

Artisans began decorating tankards with scenes depicting towns throughout southern and Western Germany, like Heidelberg and Rothenburg. They also created artistic scenes that captured biblical, allegorical, and historical events.

By the late 18th century, the covered-container laws had run their course, but because the Germans had covered their beverages for three centuries, lids became an integral part of all steins. 

The 18th-century trends continued to rise in popularity. The Bavarians had over 4000 breweries, and stoneware production increased into the late 1700s.

European porcelain started affecting stein-making in the 1720s, but these steins were expensive, so only wealthy Germans could afford them.

Just as steins improved, so did the beer. Most people considered beer to be an effective medicine. It was also safer to drink beer than water due to its sanitary production process.

As wars and rebellions decreased the wealth and power of the aristocrats, so stein makers began looking to the middle class as their target market and made products to fit their lifestyles.

Cylindrical pewter steins became popular, and especially those with stamped or engraved folk art designs. The wealthy still preferred porcelain beer steins with Baroque decorations. But by the early 19th century, most Germans preferred pewter steins for everyday use.

By 1850, beer steins featured Renaissance motifs and relief decorations. They also had inlaid porcelain lids. 

Stoneware became popular once again after 1850. Makers used molds instead of the expensive and labor-intensive handbuilt process. Although more affordable and convenient, the molded tankards were no longer considered authentic German beer steins, as they were being mass-produced.

Moisture-absorbing plaster molds helped porcelain stein producers make unique shapes and the lithophane scenes that are commonly found on the bottom of porcelain steins.

Classically trained artists from the Mettlach factory introduced Renaissance motifs into their line of relief steins. They experimented with clay and glazes, which led to colorful mosaic and etched beer steins. People loved these beautiful creations so much that even laborers were willing to spend their week’s pay for one of them.

The German beer steins produced from the mid-19th to early 20th century saw a resurgence in the popularity of stoneware steins decorated with Renaissance designs and motifs. These steins were made using clay from the Koln area, which has a distinctive white color. They were 

decorated in the Renaissance style, often having relief decorations and colored them colored them using a gray salt glaze, topped with lids of inlaid porcelain

The 20th century witnessed a decrease in Classical designs. Instead, people favored scenes depicting towns, social scenes, military commemorative, and occupational emblems. These kinds of motifs felt more common but personal to the individual. To meet the demands, pottery makers entered the scene and started making stoneware and glazed pottery beer steins.

The newest art style, Art Nouveau, grew a small but dedicated audience in early 1900, but by 1910, the political and economic landscape turned the stein-making industry upside down. World War I demanded that the materials used to make beer steins be converted for ammunition production. 

The first molded steins were made in the region of Westerwald by Reinhold Hanke. Once molds were used and beer steins were being mass produced, the beautiful highly detailed carved relief work of the early steins was no longer unique.

Beer steins come in a range of volumes, from one ounce to eight gallons. Steins most commonly fall in the 16.9-ounce range. Steins can sell for under $50 or over $5,000, but many sell in the $100 to $500 range.

To read more articles on antiques, please visit the Antiques Articles section of my Web site.  And to stay up to the minute on antiques and collectibles, please join the over 50,000 readers by following my free online magazine, #TheAntiquesAlmanac. Learn more about "Halloween Horrors" in the 2025 Fall Edition, online now. And to read daily posts about unique objects from the past and their histories, like the #Antiques and More Collection on Facebook.

Jewelry as Wearable Art

 

QUESTION: My mother loved costume jewelry and had many, many pieces. But, years ago, when she asked if I wanted her necklaces, pins and earrings, I responded, "That junk!" Recently, I was going through some of her things and found a jewelry box full of the stuff. Is it worth anything? If not, I’m going to give it to Goodwill.

ANSWER: Believe it or not, your mother’s costume jewelry may be worth more than you ever imagined, depending on its condition and who made it. Many collectors consider it a form of wearable art and a reflection of the wearer’s personality.

Essentially, costume jewelry has been around for a long time. Artificial jewels and adornments have been worn for thousands of years. The ancient Egyptians wore bib necklaces and chokers. The ancient Greeks wore hoop earrings as well as studs and pendants. The Romans wore glass and gold bracelets. 

During the Middle Ages and Renaissance, women wore brooches, necklaces and hairpieces of real and imitation materials. Men wore earrings and paste buckles an their shoes. By this time, jewelry represented social status and wealth as well as political and religious importance. Queen Elizabeth I wore gowns encrusted with sewed on paste (rhinestones), glass, and pearls in the 16th century. 

And during the Victorian Era, women desired small, tasteful, gold, pearl and diamond jewelry. Along with rigid mores and controlled expression went the "repressed" designs of that era drab, dark and understated.

Not everyone could afford the real thing though, so middle and working-class women wore "imitation" paste jewelry, or items made out of less inexpensive materials such as   coral and jet. Yet, it took the same amount of labor to create these "false" gems as it did to produce the real. Victorian jewelry makers hard set glass in claws rather than glued in hand painted brooches. As labor was cheap, women of leaser means could afford something beautiful. And jewelry makers attempted to make imitation jewelry as close to the real thing as possible so no one could tell the difference.

Through the Edwardian Era, most jewelry was understated and dainty, although some    Edwardian clothing was heavy with beadwork to display a woman's wealth and status. Edwardian women loved costume jewelry as well—glass imitating emeralds, rubber appearing as jet, and marcasites posing as diamonds.

But then came the Jazz Age in the 1920s. . Women stepped out of their corsets and into the automobile. Strict Victorian codes of behavior fell by the wayside. Further, the austerities demanded by World War I caused the interest in precious jewelry to fade. Finally, costume jewelry began to come into its own.

Some say it was Coco Chanel who ordered specific jewelry to go with her latest "costume."  Designers created so-called "fashion jewelry and sold it at jewelry counters in department stores. Costume jewelry, considered low-line, was sold in the notions departments.

It was designer Coco Chanel who, first mixed faux jewelry with real, urging women to layer of bracelets and use other pieces with her   clothing collections. By the end of the 1920s, most couture houses such as Lanvin and Schiaparelli, had teamed up with jewelers who created faux lines to accompany their collections. 

The discovery of Tutankhamen's tomb in 1922 spurred the popularity of Egyptian-style jewelry that endured to the end of the 1930s. Women preferred black and white, so jewelry designers began using combinations of crystal and onyx, and ivory, marcasite and ebony. The cultured pearl first appeared in the 1920s and Bakelite, celluloid and other synthetic plastics had already been invented. Women wore jewelry in numerous colors of plain, multicolored and carved plastics, some accented with rhinestones and pearls. 

American women welcomed the new costume jewelry craze, and during the 1920s and 1930s, such designers as Hattie Carnegie and Miriam Haskell, who created high-end, beautifully made costume jewelry sold in such retail outlets as Saks Fifth Avenue. The working girl wasn’t forgotten, however, and in spite of, or maybe because of, the Great Depression, she wanted to put some glamor in her life, too. Maybe she couldn't afford to buy a new outfit, but she could save her money and purchase a paste or marcasite pin for 19 cents to liven up an old dress. 

Eisenberg originally made rhinestone dress clips and pins to enhance his line of Eisenberg Original clothing. But as pins continued to be stolen off his dresses, it was suggested that he maintain a store to satisfy demand for the pins. That was the beginning of the Eisenberg rhinestone jewelry business. Eisenberg always used the finest, most flawless Austrian stones from Swarovski. There are few stones of this quality anywhere, at any price today. During the 1970s, an Eisenberg necklace sold for $50. Today, that same necklace can go for as high as $1,000.

With the advent of World War II, costume jewelry factories were converted into producing supplies suppliers for the military. Many materials used in the production of costume jewelry became unavailable. Jewelry makers were forced to use sterling silver as white metal was being used in the war effort. Some designers used wood or leather as alternatives and vermeil (gold wash over sterling) was also popular. But sterling silver wasn’t only expensive but it tarnished. So after the War, most costume jewelry producers dropped its use and returned to using metals such as rhodium which is extremely durable and keeps its original shine. That’s why jewelry made with rhodium 45 years ago still has the brilliance it had the day it was made. White and gold-colored metals have remained in use for costume jewelry up to the present.

After the war, women wanted to glitter up. The biggest change came during the 1950s and 1960s, when women broke with tradition and began to wear sparkling jewelry during the day as well as in the evening. Femininity and the look of luxury were in. Politics aside, this revisionist time produced some of the most beautiful costume jewelry ever. Huge pins, large rings and bracelets, dangling earrings were de rigeur at any time of day or night. The big pin explosion large, gem-encrusted spirals, comets and stars-brightened the simple, tailored day clothes of the early I960s.

Designers to look for include Castlecliff, Lisner, Mazer, Emmons (forerunner of Sarah    Coventry), Ciner, Jomaz, Weiss, Richter and Schreiner, to name but a few.

Techniques for making fine costume jewelry remain time-consuming even today. Casting, molding, and stone settings are still done by hand for the best pieces, and they become collectible and increase value almost as seen as they disappear from the marketplace. While machines made lesser lines which can be found by the hundreds in department and variety stores. The jewelry treasured today, such as early marcasite and plastic jewelry, were also made by machines With the imprimatur of age, nobody  calls costume jewelry junk anymore.

It used to be that costume jewelry could be found at garage and yard sales in bags marked “Junk Jewelry—$5 takes it all.” Today, that’s most unlikely, especially in the suburbs around big cities. The early 1990s saw a rapid escalation in prices as marked costume jewelry became a "hot" collectible especially high-end big city shopping areas and popular tourist destinations. Prices escalated into the stratosphere as collectors searched for less common examples. This was the result of European buyers paying huge sums to dealers for American-made costume jewelry, then selling it for even higher prices overseas. But over time, prices began to settle. And while those for the best pieces stayed high, the prices for mid to lower-range pieces dropped.

As with many vintage collectibles, reproductions by some former jewelry makers, such costume jewelry makers, such as Eiisenberg, affected the costume jewelry market by the end of the 20th century. These piece, using leftover materials from former production lines,  are often sold a special limited editions and come with a certificate of authenticity. As with other limited edition collectibles, these pieces usually sell to novice collectors and rarely appreciate in value. 

To read more articles on antiques, please visit the Antiques Articles section of my Web site.  And to stay up to the minute on antiques and collectibles, please join the over 30,000 readers by following my free online magazine, #TheAntiquesAlmanac. Learn more about "Halloween Horrors" in the 2025 Fall Edition, online now. And to read daily posts about unique objects from the past and their histories, like the #Antiques and More Collection on Facebook.

Home Entertainment Before the Phonograph

 

QUESTION: I have a Gem Roller Organ that has been in my family for some time.  It spent the last few years in the attic.  The bellows seem to be working and the keys respond to the pins, but it has stopped playing.  What can you tell me about it? Also, can it be repaired?

ANSWER: You’ve got one of the original Gem Roller Organs produced by the Autophone Company of Ithaca, New York.  Since it’s intact and in relatively good condition, it most likely needs cleaning, which you should have done by a professional who works on music boxes and gramophones.

In 1884, the Autophone Company developed a hand-cranked roller reed organ which operated by forcing air out through reeds under pressure with exposed bellows. The musical notes were traditionally represented by wire bridges or staples, which were formed by hand according to the length of each note and inserted at the correct location around the circumference of the barrel. As the barrel was turned, the projections operated a valve mechanism to admit air into the musical pipes or reeds.

The company named its most common and least expensive one, a vacuum-operated model, “The Gem Roller Organ.” It was basically a 20-note suction-operated reed organ in a light wooden table-top case measuring 14.5 inches wide, 12 inches deep, and 8 inches high, and weighing 6.5 pounds.

The roller consisted of a solid wood cylinder measuring a little over 6 inches long and nearly 2 inches in diameter. It had a mounting hole with a metal bushing at each end, and an offset drive hole at the left-hand end. Tiny pins, standing .05 inches above the surface of the roller, resulted in 110 pins per revolution. 

The roller made three complete turns per tune, with the pins arranged on a spiral path of .10 inch pitch. The physical length of each tune equaled 16.5 inches or 330 pins, creating a playing time of about 40 seconds, giving an effective "roll speed" of only 2 feet per minute and a time resolution of 8 pins per second. The mechanical alignment needed to be precise at this speed, as timing errors from bent pins or pallets were very noticeable.

The company produced over 1,000 different rollers, containing a broad selection of religious, military, operatic, and music-hall tunes that were popular from the 1880s through the 1890s.

Autophone mounted the roller, drive mechanism, and pallet valves on cast-iron brackets on the top front section of the case. Workers mounted the brass reeds on the inside of the sloping panel, directly behind the pallets. They mounted the pumping bellows or feeders in the lower section of the case, with the reservoir at the top rear. Black rubberized “bellows cloth” covered the rear section of the reservoir which moved up and down as the instrument plays

The roller organ had an ingenious drive mechanism that was both simple and effective. Two short horizontal shafts held the roller between them and an arm drove it at its left-hand end. The springs on the support shafts pushed the roller towards the left, allowing it to travel .30 of an inch to the right as the tune progressed 

After two more turns, the flattened pin attached to the roller shaft reached the tab on the forked arm, just as the tune came to its end. With another turn of the crank, the pin pressed downwards on the arm, which in turn pushed the roller frame forward clearing  the keys. The forked arm then pulls the roller frame rearward and engages the driving worm, ready to start again. Multiple verses of a song or hymn can be played continuously just by continuing to crank.

The lower ends of the keys were bent upwards to engage with the pins on the rollers. The pins pushed the keys about .040 of an inch, amplified by the lever arms into a  movement at the pallets. The keys oscillated slightly as a succession of pins passed, giving a tremolo effect to the longer notes.

A set of 20 brass reeds, mounted in a wooden block attached to the inside face of the sloping front panel, immediately behind the pallet valves, produced the music. Air entered through the slots in the front face when the pallets were lifted, passing through the reeds into the reservoir, and out through the feeder bellows underneath.

The reed block, machined from a solid block of wood, measured 1.75 inches high by 7 inches long. The roller organ had no soundboard. The sound radiated directly from the reeds and through the pallet openings. The music box had no way to control the volume.

The roller organ’s design placed the lower notes in the upper section of the block, so that the greater leverage of the longer keys would give a greater opening distance and a less-restricted air flow.

The Gem Roller Organ used conventional American organ reeds which had flat tongues and produced a strong sound. These produced a musical scale of 20 selected notes over 3 octaves. All instruments using the same-size rollers used the same scale, but the actual key and pitch often varied.

Because of its relative simplicity, the company was able to keep the cost of its roller organ affordable. Sears & Roebuck, in their 1902 Catalog, offered the Gem Roller Organ for as low as $3.25, including three rollers. Contracting with Autophone to produce large quantities of these devices enabled Sears to sell in volume and keep its price low.

The Gem Roller Organ, available in either a painted black or walnut-like finish with gold stenciled applied designs, used teeth or pins embedded into a 20-note wooden roller, similar to the cylinders used in Swiss music boxes. Pins operated on valve keys while a gear turned the roller. The mass-produced 20-note rollers, priced as low as 18 cents each—and according to the Sears Catalog, less than the price of a traditional sheet of music—played a wide range of tunes, from classical to sacred to ethnic and popular tunes. The 1902 Sears Catalog listed 220 different rollers of the over 1,200 different titles then available. 

The tone of a roller organ was similar to a cabinet parlor organ of the time. At 16 inches long, 14 inches wide and 9 inches high, the Gem Roller Organ was small and light enough to place on a parlor table. 

Since Autophone usually printed the manufacturing date on the bottom of the case, it’s relatively easy to date the device, itself. All rollers show a copyright date of July 14, 1885, even though the Autophone sold them from the late 1880's through the late 1920's—an amazing lifespan for a single basic design. Their success may be attributed to the full, rich sound and pleasing music arrangements offered on the rollers.

Unfortunately, roller organs quickly fell out of favor after the introduction of the phonograph around the turn of the 20th century even though they cost much less than disk or cylinder music boxes manufactured during the same period. Considered the common-mans form of entertainment since music boxes and other instruments were much more expensive, roller organs could be found in many middle class homes. Most eventually ended up in the attic, in the barn, or simply thrown away. Today, roller organs sell for anywhere from $350 to over $800, depending on the condition and the number of rollers included. The rollers, themselves, sell for about $20 each.

To read more articles on antiques, please visit the Antiques Articles section of my Web site.  And to stay up to the minute on antiques and collectibles, please join the over 30,000 readers by following my free online magazine, #TheAntiquesAlmanac. Learn more about "The Sporting Life" in the 2025 Summer Edition, online now. And to read daily posts about unique objects from the past and their histories, like the #Antiques and More Collection on Facebook.