A jukebox is a partially automated music-playing device, usually a coin-operated machine, that can play specially selected songs from self-contained media. The traditional jukebox is rather large with a rounded top and has colored lighting going up the front of the machine on its vertical sides. The classic jukebox has buttons with letters and numbers on them that,
when combined, are used to indicate a specific song from a particular record. The Wurlitzer model "1015-Bubbler" typifies the look and is arguably the most popular selling Jukebox model of all time.
Coin-operated music boxes and
player pianos carved out a place for automatic pay-per-tune music in fairgounds, amusement parks and other public places a few decades before the introduction of reliable coin-operated phonographs. Some of these automatic musical instruments were extremely well built and have survived to this day in the hands of collectioners and museums.
The immediate ancestor of the jukebox, called the "Coin-slot phonograph", was the first medium of sound recording encountered by the general public, before mass produced home audio equipment became common. Such machines began to be mass produced in 1889, using phonograph cylinders for records. The earliest machines played but a single record (of about 2 minutes of music or entertainment), but
soon devices were developed that allowed customers to choose between multiple records. In the 1910s the cylinder was superseded by the
Gramophone record. The term "juke box" came into use in the United States in the 1930s, derived from African-American slang "jook" meaning "dance". The shellac 78 rpm record dominated jukeboxes until the Seeburg Corporation introduced an all
45 rpm vinyl record jukebox in 1950.
Top 12 Most Popular Antique Jukeboxes
» Wurlitzer model "1015-Bubbler" (1940) » Rock-Ola model 1413
Premier (1942)
» Rock-Ola model 1422 and 1426 (1946-47) » Wurlitzer Model 750
and 750E (1941)
» Wurlitzer Model 800 (1941) » Wurlitzer Model 850 (1941)
» Wurlitzer Models 1080 and 1080-A (1947-48) » Wurlitzer Jukebox
Model 1100 (1948-49)
» AMI Rowe "Top Flight" Model (1936-38) » AMI Rowe Model "A"
Jukebox of (1946-47)
» Seeburg Cadet (1940) » Gabel Kuro (1940)
