About Eddie The Collector



 

 

 
 

Eddie the Collector grew up in Waco, Texas.  Back in the mid-50's, his mother began a project during the summer of taping back together many of her old pieces of sheet music from the 20's when she was a college student from 1920-22.  Being an accomplished pianist, she would play through such pieces as "Yes, We Have no Bananas", "You've Got to See Mama Ev'ry Night", "Ain't We Got Fun", "Stumbling", and so on.  Eddie was entranced with these tunes and asked from whence they came and received the reply "this is the music your father and I listened to and danced to back in the '20s".  Even sooner, he received two of the Alma Gluck records as Christmas presents, "Listen to the Mockingbird" and "Carry Me Back to Old Virginny" from his paternal grandparents, early on whetting his appetite for the old early 1900's sound and rhythms. 

In the late 1950's, Eddie began buying records from an antique store in Waco called Smith's Den of Antiquity--they were stacked in many stacks on a large table and sold for 10 cents a piece.  He began to see the name Fletcher Henderson frequently on what is called the Flag Label Columbia and always liked the music.  He began to associate certain labels and orchestras with music that was always pleasing:   Brunswick, Columbia, Victor, George Olson, Isham Jones, Bennie Krueger, the words Fox Trot, etc.

After some months of buying and listening, and acquiring about 20 records, it was suggested by several people he meet a local collector by the name of Robert (R.E.M.) Gottlieb, who had begun his own collection in 1925 at the age of 16.  By this time, he'd amassed a collection of some 10-15,000 records, all precisely shelved and cataloged.  Eddie initially took a list of titles of 1920's standards such as "Yes Sir! That's My Baby", Five Foot Two Eyes of Blue, Bye Bye Blackbird, et al, simply wanting to acquire as many original recordings as possible, nothing more.  All the "Wants" were acquired in no time, and what opened up before Eddie was an unimagined number of "unknown" titles by many, many orchestras, all wonderful in their own right.  During the next 20-25 years, Eddie bought, sold and traded records with Mr. Gottlieb, until Mr. Gottlieb's health failed in the mid-80's and he passed away in 1986 at the age of 77.  Several months before his passing, Eddie's friend in West, Texas, bought the remainder of Mr Gottlieb's collection and it has since been dispersed through e-Bay auctions to other collectors.

Eddie resided in Dallas, Texas 38 years and worked for 30 years at Lone Star Gas Co., receiving early retirement at the end of 1997 upon the merger with DP&L and formation of TXU.  Eddie sold his Dallas home in 2005 and is now living in semi-retirement in his home town of Waco, Texas, still enjoying his records.

Eddie can be reached at:  my53cadhasac@yahoo.com

 


 

 
 
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