Universal Talking Machine Manufacturing Company

American record company, record factory and gramophone factory, funded in 1901 by Frank Seaman and La Dow. Notorious for its patent infringement and piracy of records.

The Universal Talking Machine Manufacturing Company was created in November 1901 after Universal Talking Machine Co. became the sales branch of the new talking machine factory.

In 1902, Columbia Phonograph Co., having designed its own gramophones via International Zonophone Company as a Gramophone & Typewriter subsidiary.

Johnson acquired the company as an entirely separate entity from Victor Talking Machine, in order to avoid any legal conflict with Columbia and to control the competition to his own discs. The Universal Talking Machine Company remained independent as a budget label, with some minimal capital borrowed from Johnson, an office change and the switch from Auburn Button Works to the Duranoid Company, Victor's pressing associate, and finally a licensing of patents. This meant an end to Universal Talking Machine's history of patent infringement.

Legal issues continued in 1904, however, when composer Zonophone Concert Band. In the later case, a number of reissued records still announced Herbert's name on the track itself and were subsequently reissued with the incriminating section embossed out. By late 1904 most Herbert fakes had been replaced.

New Zonophone discs were pressed by mid-1904 in a black shellac of superior quality, and the Zon-O-Phone Record label returned. By the start of 1905, 7-, 9-, and 11-inch discs began being phased out in favor of the new standard 10-inch discs. The last 7-inch discs were pressed in early 1906. A small number of 12-inch discs was announced in early 1907, but never gathered much interest. Finally, the 10-inch double-sided disc began being pressed in 1908, following Columbia's announcement of their own.

In 1905, a Universal Talking Machine mobile studio led by Henry J. Hagen traveled to Argentina to record music for Casa Repetto's music store, years after the German branch International Zonophone Company did the same. These 10-inch records were marketed as Disco Zonofono (2) and credited to Universal Talking Machine Manufacturing Company.

Around 1908, Universal Talking Machine began offering licensing rights for its recordings to retailers. These micro labels were single-sided records of old Zon-O-Phone masters. Examples were the Aretino and Busy Bee labels, which were used in schemes in which a phonograph was given away or sold very cheaply when a specified number of records were purchased at the same time. The phonographs were modified to prevent the use of standard records — with a large rectangular turntable lug on the Busy Bee machine and a three-inch spindle on the Aretino. This supposedly ensured a captive audience for the matching records. The artists were often left anonymous on Oxford Disc Record and other client labels.

Ongoing legal problems with the [Invalid Artist] led to an increasingly tight grip by Johnson until the decision was taken to close the Universal Talking Machine offices in 1910 and move them to Philadelphia, closing the recording studio. From 1910 to 1912 Zonophone Records were manufactured and recorded by Victor, and as they were competing against themselves, attention to Zonophone waned until the companies and label were discontinued in June 1912.