Boffins chapify Amazonian assistant using Belgian blowers

Antique Alexa telephones by Grain Design

More news featuring items from Belgium, although "news" is perhaps not quite the le mot juste seeing as this article has been languishing in my Drafts for over a year.  I had intended to start a new blog with it but then it occurred to me that I have enough of a job keeping this one going without adding a second one and besides which the idea featured in the article still fits the Eclectic Ephemera ethos, so here it is.  Despite being more than a year old the subject matter is still current and interesting and follows on nicely from my previous Belgian-based Tintin post.

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Indeed an antique Belgian telephone (like the Regent model, above) with Amazon Alexa built in is something I could just see Tintin using were he around today, although whether he could stretch to the eye-watering asking price is another matter (then again he might if he had Red Rackham's Treasure - get on with it Peter Jackson!!  Ahem, sorry.)

In any event (and to return to the current subject) the re-purposing of vintage - and in this case, non-functional - equipment to include modern technology is something I consistently admire, not only as a means of giving a new lease of life to what would be an otherwise redundant item destined for the scrapheap but also for just the sheer incongruity of the latest tech being hidden within something supposedly obsolete.

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I have featured similar ideas here before in the shape of the Tweephone - a rotary-dial telephone capable of sending Tweets - and the Twittertape, which went one better and used an antique tickertape machine hooked up to the internet to do the same thing.  Now we have the Alexaphone, a genius idea out of Los Angeles which sees antique telephones being converted to run Amazon's Alexa virtual assistant technology, such as is more commonly found in that company's Echo speakers.

As with most modern technology virtual assistance AI is largely a closed book to me and something I intend to keep that way, as the idea of artificial intelligence in general is not something I am especially keen on.  Nor am particularly enamoured with the glut of so-called "smart" technology now available - not only do we have the likes of Google Assistant, Windows Cortana and the aforementioned Amazon Alexa but also smartphones, smart TVs, smart meters and now even flippin' video doorbells all of which are recording your every word and movement!  Where it will all end I wouldn't like to say, but the whole business doesn't seem very "smart" at all (except for the companies that are harvesting the resultant data) and is something I will vehemently oppose for as long as possible.

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It is for this reason as well that I like the idea of these devices, for one particular aspect of their original design, the telephone hook, thwarts one of the virtual assistant's most invidious foibles - the fact that it is always "on" and therefore listening to everything that's going on around it.  Not so with the Alexaphone, which is only on when you lift the receiver!  No fear of some faceless, polo-necked eye-tea wallah in a metal and glass office somewhere in California transcribing what you had for breakfast this morning.  Instead just lift the receiver, ask your question and Alexa will respond - then just thank it and hang up.  Brilliant!

Whether this marriage of vintage and modern technology is worth upwards of $1500 I'll leave you to decide but - practical or not, art or no - it is nevertheless a splendid idea and one I am glad to see realised.

New life for old corner drugstore

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Vintage pharmacy is reborn at Heritage Square Museum

Here's a happy story with a vintage flavour from Los Angeles, where the fascinating-looking Heritage Square Museum has just gained a wonderful new "exhibit". A living history museum depicting southern California as it would have been at the turn of the last century, Heritage Square seems to have a wonderful selection of Victorian-era buildings to its name.  It had never had a chemists - or to use the American vernacular, a drugstore - though, until now.

The manner in which Colonial Drug has been introduced into Heritage Square is a heartwarming example of a business coming full circle and involving three generations of a local pharmaceutical family.  For the original Colonial Drug store, started in the 1920s by Latvian immigrant George Simmons, sat only a few streets away from where Heritage Square is now.  Thanks to Simmons' stockpiling habits his family, consisting of two sons and now their children (all of whom have worked at the various incarnations of Colonial Drug over the years), are in the unique position of having boxes of patent medicines and other vintage treatments from the 1890s to the 1950s.

Now after 20 years of sorting through these boxfuls of weird and wonderful potions the brothers Simmons and their families have opened a period-specific Colonial Drug store in the Heritage Square, using all the old products kept by George Simmons all those decades ago.  It was a stroke of minor genius to think of the living history museum as an outlet for these otherwise unwanted goods and top marks must go to Heritage Square people for seeing the potential and allowing - for the first time - the construction of a new building, an exact replica of the original Colonial Drug.

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So the store that began decades ago is back just as it was, albeit now as a living recreation, stocked full of original medications and still staffed by the Simmons family.  Should I ever find myself in Los Angeles a trip to the Heritage Square Museum and Colonial Drug (and its soda fountain!) would definitely be on my list of experiences.

Neon light left on since 1935 racks up $17,000 in electric bills

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Neon light left on since 1935 racks up $17K in electric bills

This blog often features stories of vintage machinery being unearthed and then restored to working order (witness the recent MG story), but this is one of those unusual occasions when someone has come across something that was still working after having remained undiscovered for over 70 years!

Tales of long-lived light bulbs are not as rare as one might be given to think, with several even older than 70 years known throughout the UK and USA, but this is the first example in my experience of a newer neon light being found still in working order - and in such remarkable circumstances to boot (not to mention the fact that it has been on continuously for all this time, whereas other "old bulbs" are switched off and on)!

Clifton's Cafeteria unveils its original facade after almost 50 years

These remarkable circumstances first began to unfold back in February when Clifton's Cafeteria, a landmark Los Angeles restaurant that dates back to the mid-1930s, began to be restored by its new owner.  Why I didn't do a post about it at the time I can't imagine, but the link to the original story in the L.A. Times is above.  Following the removal of the cafe's later 1960s covering the building's original frontage from when it was first built in 1904 was revealed (and jolly nice it looks too - or will look once it is renovated, I'm sure).

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Work has since begun on the internals, at which point this amazing neon light has been discovered buried behind a wall!  Still on after maybe 77 years, at a potential cost of $17,000 (although I wonder if the Los Angeles electricity board will waive the fee?).  An incredible testament to neon's longevity and also to the original owner of Clifton's who, by all accounts, simply built over or reused old features - who knows what else may be uncovered during the restoration?  Already other artefacts such as a wall map from the building's pre-'35 department store days and vintage floor tiles have been found, among other things.  What a fantastic place!

Happily the new owner recognises the historical importance of these discoveries and the building in general and plans a sympathetic restoration of the restaurant to its 1930s heyday - with perhaps a few modern concessions - including an area to display these wonderful finds (and even a replica of the original transparent landscape that the neon light - which will stay on - would have sat behind!).

I wish the new owner the best of luck with Clifton's Cafeteria and can't wait to see what other finds are just waiting to be found in there.  I hope the people of Los Angeles take the place to their hearts (it sounds as though it was already a popular eatery) and if I'm ever in L.A. I know where I'm having lunch!

1925 Beverly Hills home frozen in time

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1925 Beverly Hills home frozen in time

Another slow week of news and a bit of a break to enjoy the early Spring weather and have something of a rest has meant that it has been a while since my last blog post but, like buses, a few things have come along in the last couple of days that I intend to feature here.

This first story is reminiscent of the 100-year old French mansion and 1930s Parisian flat that were both left untouched for decades and which were reported on a year or two ago.  This time, though, it is a house of 1925 vintage that has remained unchanged for the last 87 years, the result of the late owner being the daughter of the couple who built it in Beverly Hills, Los Angeles.

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One of the "Mediterranean" styles of house that proved so popular among the rich and famous of California throughout the 1920s and '30s, Winter House is even more remarkable for retaining all of its period features.  Copper window shutters, staff buzzers and intercoms, telephone recesses, the original cooker & boilers and even a 78rpm record library (above) all still remain just as they did in 1925.  It is a truly amazing snapshot of 1920s Los Angeles and now for the first time in its 87-year history it is up for sale.

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A cool $5½million (£3.4million) is the asking price for this Beverly Hills gem, so well within the reach of a good many residents I should imagine - although quite beyond the purse of this poor blogger.

If we were to take the type of person who appears on "reality" shows and celebrity gossip programmes as the average Beverly Hills denizen one might be worried for the future of such a wonderful building, but judging by this article in the LA Times the estate agents seem to be well aware of the significance of what they've got and the interest expressed so far sounds beneficial.  Since the success of The Artist Hollywood has become more aware and protective of its heritage and I feel sure that Winter House will be more appreciated and sympathetically restored as a result.