Dennis Lynch and Cassendre de la Fortrie at home with their 1961 AMI Continental jukebox.
Walnut Creek Eichler owners Dave and Lori Arango flank the Seeburg Wall-O-Matic on their kitchen table that runs to ‘Vinny,’ their Seeburg 100C nearby.
Dave looks over Vinny’s playlist.
During the 1930s, jukeboxes were credited with causing juvenile delinquency—and during World War II, for preventing it and for boosting patriotism instead.
By the time rock ‘n’ roll rolled around in the ‘50s, the jukebox industry had already begun its long, incessant slide, as radio’s top-40 stations replaced jukeboxes as the place where hits were made, and TV kept folks glued to the couch. Peak production of jukeboxes came in 1947—99,000. By 1953, the number had fallen to 59,000.
Throughout the ‘50s, the jukebox let people share their favorite songs during sock hops and frat house bashes—and at parties thrown by Dino for his Rat Pack friends.
“You can imagine, I dunno, Sammy Davis, those guys, pushing the buttons on it,” says Dennis, who received his jukebox as an engagement gift from Cassendre. It came with a letter of provenance from Dino’s wife asserting it had really been his.
Ironically, it was the jukebox that gave radio the idea for the top-40 format—playing the same few songs over and over in heavy rotation. Heavy rotation, of course, wasn’t to everyone’s taste.
When Ostoloco sought change for a dollar bill so she could play it again, the Times went on, Filipe Torres shot her twice, and the bartender as well when he intervened. “The tune had no charm for him,” the reporter observed.
No, the real reason jukeboxes still live is they are a compelling social medium—anti-social, in some cases.
Jukeboxes were simply not designed to be listened to alone. Has there ever been a jukebox with earphones?
Well, yes. In fact, what some historians consider the very first jukebox could play only one song and to only one person at a time—while holding a tube against his ear. Louis Glass’s nickel-per-song ‘Coin-o-Graph’ debuted at a saloon on Sutter Street in San Francisco, of all places, was an immediate success, and stimulated much competition.
But the jukebox didn’t become a social medium until 1906, when John Gabel’s ‘Automatic Entertainer’ used an amplifying horn that allowed a crowd to share the sounds. And it wasn’t until 1927, as the Automatic Music Instrument Co. (AMI) created the first electrically amplified box, when the music really grew loud.