Though the official birth of recorded sound began in 1878 with Thomas Edison and his "Phonograph or Speaking Machine," the arrival 10 years later of a German immigrant's invention of the "Gramophone" provided the technology for recorded media in quantity.

Edison's tinfoil recordings, it turned out, could play for only a minute or so and quickly wore out the steel needles. Emile Berliner, then a resident of Washington, D.C., included in his patent application a manufacturing technique which provided a master record from which duplicate copies could be made. This could not be accomplished with cylinders as Edison and others had conceived.

Berliner's technology was used for nearly 100 years. The concept of a spiral groove carrying a continuously varying analog representation of the original sound remained the most widely used method of sound reproduction until the late 1980's. The storing of sound as a digital code has become the new direction in sound reproduction.

Berliner also played a role in the marketing of his new product by popularizing one of the most endearing trademarks in advertising, the dog and horn representing "His Master's Voice." In 1899, Berliner himself concluded arrangements for the soon-to-be-famous painting along with its copyright for use by his U.S. Gramophone Company.

His first Gramophone, produced by outside suppliers, was not successful and forced Berliner to establish a manufacturing facility in Philadelphia. A 1900 product line of six models by a licensed supplier, Elridge Johnson, ranged in retail price from $3.00 to $25.00.

After critical patent issues were settled in 1901, Berliner and Johnson merged their business under the Victor Talking Machine Company and the watchful ear of the now famous dog and horn. Berliner remained active through the early 1920's.

Between 1912 and 1918, more than 127 million records and 2.5 instruments were sold to the public. Berliner's technical skills had created a new mass market for recorded sound that brought artists like Enrico Caruso into living rooms around the world.