SOLD! The Lost Victor Archives

The Lost Victor Archives were sold at Donley Auctions in Union, IL for $15,000 at the special phonograph and music boxes auction on June 14-15, 2023.

Following the disastrous 1904 fire that destroyed the Victor Talking Machine factory in Camden, NJ, it was assumed that the early records of the corporation had been destroyed forever. Instead, they had been safely removed by an employee who kept them at his home.

Included are the minutes of the very first meeting of the VTM shareholders on October 5, 1901, and twenty 3-ring binders of meetings and reports from 1901 to 1926, with hand-signed voting ballots and proxies of famous stockholders such as Eldridge Johnson, John Phillip Sousa, and others.