ABSTRACT
Inventor of a spring motor for Edison’s phonograph (Class M) in 1894; he was the first to receive any patent (U.S. #462,228; filed 28 Jan 1891; granted 3 Nov 1891) for a springdriven phonograph motor. Later he introduced double-mainspring models, and portable two-or four-mainspring coin-ops. He also developed the Metaphone (“Meta” being an anagram for Amet’s name; it was later called the Echophone) in 1895; it was the first cylinder phonograph with a distinct tone arm. It sold for only $5 (Edison and Columbia machines were then sold for $30-$40). However, Amet had to suspend manufacture of his player after only a few months because of court action taken by American Graphophone Co. He was also a pioneer in early sound motion pictures, using Lambert cylinders synchronized with the film. He received 11 U.S. patents in the sound recording field. [Koenigsberg 1990; Paul 1985.]
Chicago-born jazz pianist, famous for his 1936 recording of Pinetop Smith’s “Boogie Woogie” (Salabert #12001; reissued in Columbia set C-44: Boogie Woogie), “Shout for Joy” (Columbia #35961; 1939), and “Bass Goin’ Crazy” (1942) were later hits. Ammons was one of the three boogie woogie pianists featured by John Hammond in his famous “From Spirituals to Swing” concert held at Carnegie Hall in 1938. In 1941 he made an important series of duets with Pete Johnson. He died in his hometown eight years later.
