ABSTRACT
American inventor and record industry executive, born in Adrian, Michigan. He was a telegraph operator during the Civil War, and then became interested in the telephone. Among his inventions were the telephone switchboard, and the exchange. Gilliland was for many years in charge of the Bell Telephone Company’s laboratory in Boston, and he was one of the organizers of the Western Electric Co. He became an associate of Thomas A. Edison and general agent for the Edison Phonograph Co. in 1887. He made the first working model of the new type of Edison phonograph, based on the 1878 British patent, and developed other Edison ideas. As payment for his work, Edison gave Gilliland exclusive sales rights in the U.S. on Edison products. The Gilliland (Edison) Sales Co. was established to handle those transactions in June 1888. Gilliland patented the Spectacle device, which permitted an easy switch from record to playback mode on the phonograph (U.S. #386, 974), and made improvements on it; it was used until after 1900 on Edison business machines. A financial imbroglio led to a break with Edison, and to a sale of the Gilliland stock to Jesse H. Lippincott in June 1888 for $250,000. He became associated with the Automatic Phonograph Exhibition Co., and secured a patent on a coin-op for them (#443, 254) in 1890. Gilliland died in Pelham Manor, New York. [Koenigsberg 1990; Read 1976.]
Irish/American bandmaster, born in County Galway. He moved first to Canada, then to Salem, Massachusetts. In 1859 he organized Gilmore’s Band, and became with it “the first American bandmaster to gain international fame” (Brooks). He was with the Union Army in the Civil War, and composed the classic “When Johnny Comes Marching Home” under the pseudonym of Louis Lambert. He gained acclaim for directing huge forces at the Peace Jubilees of 1869 and 1872, the latter with a chorus of 20,000 and an orchestra of 2,000. His band toured Canada, the U.S., and Europe. After he died, in St. Louis, Victor Herbert directed the band and made recordings with it. Gilmore began recording in 1891 for Edison. His band was heard on brown wax cylinder #2, doing the “Coronation March” from Prophäte, and on other marches as well as a medley of college songs (#35). In 1896, the band recorded for Columbia.
