Comments on: In the Archives: Helping the Deserving Poor

By: Irene Hieber

Irene Hieber — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 15:37:45 +0000

Sure enough. It is definitely a dictaphone.

By: Laura Bien

Laura Bien — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 12:45:39 +0000

Dan: Amazing….remember those well. No maintenance, even–one wonders how many more years you can use them. Neato.

By: Dan Ezekiel

Dan Ezekiel — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 11:24:13 +0000

I don’t know if there will be antique Iphones, but at school I have several Apple IIe’s that are 30 years old and work perfectly. They use 5 1/4 inch floppy disks and have never had any maintenance of any kind.

By: Laura Bien

Laura Bien — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 19:53:42 +0000

Eleanor: Hmm, seems to be a theme here among these guesses… :)

By: Laura Bien

Laura Bien — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 19:53:07 +0000

Jim: Wow, what a find! One wonder where that gem had been hiding, somewhere on campus. The ReUse Center on S. Industrial is another wonderful place in which to poke around; found an old two-bell wall telephone there once, though sadly without its magneto.

By: Eleanor Pollack

Eleanor Pollack — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 17:10:32 +0000

First thought was some sort of dictating machine such as the Parlograph or Ediphone which used cylinders for recording.

By: Jim Rees

Jim Rees — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 14:48:26 +0000

A little too easy. Note that it’s not necessarily a Dictaphone, which was the largest company making dictating machines, but there were others.

I used to own a Dictaphone, which I bought for $5 at UM Property Control (now Dispo) around 1962. It came with a box full of blank cylinders and after changing a few tubes it worked fine.

By: abc

abc — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 14:16:34 +0000

Sure there will be antique iDevices but they will be far less interesting to average people, unless you are an electrical engineer. Take the iPod (almost an antique today). 100 years from now it will apprear to be a skipping stone. People seeing it will turn to one another and say, “Wow, people had to carry their music around. Implants are so much easier.” “But hey what were those wires for?” “They stuffed those things in their ears too. Ewwwww!”

By: Laura Bien

Laura Bien — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 14:03:12 +0000

TJ: Hmm, another intriguing guess. Aside from a little rust, this item is in very good condition. Does make one wonder how long modern-day devices will be around. Will there ever be an antique iPhone?

By: Laura Bien

Laura Bien — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 14:00:56 +0000

ABC: Thank you; it is good to be back. Errant marshmallows underfoot everywhere is no laughing matter, to be sure. The Ypsi Museum has an ancient old "pneumatic cleaner." One hand pumps the cylinder while the other moves the suction head. It's billed as "portable," which in this case is a somewhat fanciful use of that word. Some pictures of it.