My grandfather Joe Goodson and his brother Jack founded the Goodson record company back in the 1920s. Both were born in London. The Goodson record company was one of the first record companies to adopt a flat plastic record instead of the cylindrical format. And they were flexible, meaning they could be bent with our forefinger and your thumb.
The records were made of a white opaque celluloid. They were published in the autumn of 1928. They invented this technology, and then reached out to advertisers to help fund the growth of the company and the broader use of the flat records. Back then the Goodson brothers already understood that the financing of their venture depended on iconic marketing brands to pay for the records development and mass production for mass audiences. This is how their business was built.
Here's one of the Goodson records in action.
The records were produced by the Goodson Record Company, Ltd., 12 Old Burlington Street, London, W.1. (GB). They cost 1s. 9d each. The Goodson records were made from Rhodoid, a synthetic material covered by British and overseas patents. At first they used the records made by the American Emerson-Scranton studios (31000-series). After a few issues they used the Grey Gull-Van Dyke-Radiex catalog. Dominion and Filmophone used that catalog too. At the end they used English matrices exclusively.
They have no label like the ordinary records. In fact, the whole record is used to print the information and was in fact a picture disc avant-la-lettre. There are several types. The 31000-series is also found on the Goodson produced discs carrying advertisements for Boothe Chemis, Wellsbach Lamps, Henleys, London Virginia Tobacco Cº and others. It seems that the London Virginia Tobacco Cº records, made for Sketch Virginia Cigarettes were sold in tobacco stores.
Here is some additional infomation
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