Today, it is hard to imagine a world without recorded audio, and for the most part that started with Edison’s invention of the phonograph. However, for most of its history, the phonograph was a one-way medium. Although early phonographs could record with a separate needle cutting into foil or wax, most record players play only records made somewhere else. The problem is, this cuts down on what you can do with them. When offices were full of typists and secretaries, there was the constant problem of telling the typist what to type. Whole industries developed around that problem, including the Dictaphone company.

The issue is that most people can talk faster than others can write or type. As a result, taking dictation is frustrating as you have to stop, slow down, repeat yourself, or clarify dubious words. Shorthand was one way to equip a secretary to write as fast as the boss can talk. Steno machines were another way. But the dream was always a way to just speak naturally, at your convenience, and somehow have it show up on a typewritten page. That’s where the Dictaphone company started.

History of the Dictaphone

Unsurprisingly, Dictaphone’s founder was the famous Alexander Graham Bell. Although Edison invented the phonograph, Bell made many early improvements to the machine, including the use of wax instead of foil as a recording medium. He actually started the Volta Graphophone Company, which merged with the American Graphophone Company that would eventually become Columbia Records.

In 1907, the Columbia Phonograph Company trademarked the term Dictaphone. While drum-based machines were out of style in other realms, having been replaced by platters, the company wanted to sell drum-based machines that let executives record audio that would be played back by typists. By 1923, the company spun off on its own.

Edison, of course, also created dictation machines. There were many other companies that made some kind of dictation machine, but Dictaphone became the standard term for any such device, sort of like Xerox became a familiar term for any copier.

Dictaphones were an everyday item in early twentieth-century offices for dictation, phone recording, and other audio applications. Not to mention a few other novel uses. In 1932, a vigilante organization used a Dictaphone to bug a lawyer’s office suspected of being part of a kidnapping.

Some machines could record and playback. Others, usually reserved for typists, were playback-only. In addition, some machines could “shave” wax cylinders to erase a cylinder for future use. Of course, eventually you’d shave it down to the core, and then it was done.

The Computer History Archives has some period commercials and films from Dictaphone, and you can see them in the videos below.

As mentioned, Dictaphone wasn’t the only game in town. Edison was an obvious early competitor. We were amused that the Edison devices had a switch that allowed them to operate on AC or DC current.

Later, other companies like IBM would join in. Some, like the Gray Audograph and the SoundScriber used record-like disks instead of belts or drums. Of course, eventually, magnetic tape cassettes were feasible, too, and many people made recorders that could be used for dictation and many other recording duties.

The Dictabelt

For the first half of the twentieth century, Dictaphones used wax cylinders. However, in 1947, they began making machines that pressed a groove into a Lexan belt — a “Dictabelt,” at first called a “Memobelt.” These were semi-permanent and, since you couldn’t easily melt over some of the wax, difficult to tamper with, which helped make them admissible in court. Apparently, you could play a Dictabelt back about 20 times before it would be too beat up to play.

These belts found many uses. For one, Dictaphone was a major provider to police departments and other similar services, recording radio traffic and telephone calls. In the late 1970s, the House Select Committee on Assassinations used Dictaphone belts from the Dallas police department recording in 1963 to do audio analysis on the Kennedy assassination. Many Dictaphones found homes in courtrooms, too.

As you can see in the commercials in the video, Dictabelts would fit in an envelope: they are about 3.5 in x  12 in or 89 mm x 300 mm. The “portable” machine promised to let you dictate from anywhere, keep meeting minutes, and more. A single belt held 15 minutes of audio, and the color gives you an idea of when the belt was made.

Magnetic Personality

Of course, Dictaphone wasn’t the only game in town for machines like this. IBM released one that used a magnetic belt called a “Magnabelt’ that you could edit. Dictaphone followed suit. These, of course, were erasable.

Even as late as 1977, you could find Dictaphones in “word processing operations” like the one in the video with the catchy tune, below. Of course, computers butted into both word processing and dictation with products like Via Voice or DragonDictate. Oddly, DragonDictate is from Nuance, which bought what was left of Dictaphone.

Insides

Since this is Hackaday, of course, you want to see the insides of some of these machines. A video from [databits] gives us a peek below.

Offices have certainly changed. Most people do their own typing now. Your phone can record many hours of crystal-clear audio. Computers can even take your dictation now, if you insist.

Should you ever find a Dictabelt and want to digitize it for posterity, you might find the video below from [archeophone] useful. They make a modern playback unit for old cylinders and belts.

We’d love to see a homebrew Dictabelt recorder player using more modern tech. If you make one, be sure to let us know. People recorded on the darndest things. Tape caught on primarily because of World War II Germany and Bing Crosby.