Wisconsin 101

OBJECT HISTORY: Paramount Records Power Wheel

Located near the heart of Grafton, WI, a rusted power wheel sits on the steep west bank of the Milwaukee River. Despite its corroded appearance, this metal device once powered an entire factory responsible for pressing popular shellac records. The history of…

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December 29, 2020

Wisconsin Made / Music, Theatre & Cinema / Art, Sport & Entertainment / Port Washington / Object Histories / Ozaukee County / Paramount Records 78 / Manufacturing & Trade / 1918-1945 / Region 8 - South East

OBJECT HISTORY: Paramount Records 78

Created by the management of the Wisconsin Chair Company, a furniture making business based in Port Washington, Wisconsin, Paramount Records was initially incorporated to help sell phonographic cabinets in the late 1910s. Relying on resourceful talent recruiters and a relatively cheap production process, Paramount Records became one of the leading blues music record producers in the 1920s, and is today recognized by…

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September 10, 2020

Read more about the article Recruiting Talent

Louis Armstrong bezoekt Amsterdam *29 oktober 1955

Music, Theatre & Cinema / Art, Sport & Entertainment / Port Washington / Related Stories / Ozaukee County / Ethnicity & Identity / Paramount Records 78 / 1918-1945 / Region 8 - South East

Recruiting Talent

With a roster that included Louis Armstrong, Jelly Roll Morton, and Ethel Waters, Paramount Records became perhaps the most important blues recording company of the 1920s. Their success was dependent on their ability to recruit black performers and reach a broad black…

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August 24, 2018

Read more about the article The Record Production Process

Disc-cutting lathe, 1930s.

Wisconsin Made / Music, Theatre & Cinema / Grafton / Art, Sport & Entertainment / Related Stories / Ethnicity & Identity / Ozaukee County / Paramount Records 78 / Manufacturing & Trade / 1918-1945 / Region 8 - South East

The Record Production Process

Paramount Record’s parent company, the United Phonographic Corporation, a subsidiary of the Wisconsin Chair Company, decided to begin recording and pressing records to include with their phonograph cabinets in the early 1920s. Paramount initially recorded in studios throughout the United States. They…

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August 24, 2018

Wisconsin Made / Music, Theatre & Cinema / Art, Sport & Entertainment / Port Washington / Ethnicity & Identity / Ozaukee County / Related Stories / Paramount Records 78 / Manufacturing & Trade / 1918-1945 / Region 8 - South East

Paramount Records

The Wisconsin Chair Company’s (WCC) decision to enter the record label industry was an economic one. With their subsidiary company, the United Phonographic Corporation (UPC), picking up steam, management at the WCC began pressing records. The UPC’s first record labels, Puritan and…

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August 24, 2018

Industry / Wisconsin Made / Home Furnishings / Port Washington / Related Stories / Ozaukee County / Everyday Life / Paramount Records 78 / Manufacturing & Trade / 1877-1900 / 1900-1918 / Region 8 - South East

The Wisconsin Chair Company

Founded in 1888 by Frederick A. Dennett, the Wisconsin Chair Company (WCC) was perhaps the most important business in Ozaukee County at the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth century. The company, located along the northern shore of the…

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July 16, 2018