Companies that vanished: RCA's legacy still resonates

Let's not forget that RCA Victor sold "zillions" of Elvis Presley records, along with many other artists. The old 78 rpm and 45 rpm labels look "neat." Many, but not all, of the label's pressings were very good. The profits from the music division must have helped to compensate for the company's "boo-boos." We can still buy "BMG - RCA" compact discs. At one point, wasn't the "Victor" word dropped? I read that Elvis was involved in a bidding was over his contract with Sam Phillips when they had Elvis' initial success on Sun Records.
Several labels sent reps to try to buy Elvis' contract, including one from Atlantic, but there was a snow storm, and the RCA rep was the first to get through. At about this time, Carl Perkins had a big national hit with "Blue Suede Shoes" and Steve Sholes wondered if he hadn't acquired the "wrong artist." Sam assured Steve that he had, in fact, purchased the right contract - Sam knew!
For many years it was great to see the big RCA letters on their building in Hollywood. When the letters were removed I looked in the phone book for anything concerning RCA, and the company had vanished fron Los Angeles, completely!

My family would only buy RCA TV's. I had the RCA XL 100 15" TV for over 20 yrs and it was still working when I sold it.

My mom bought a 5" RCA TV just 2 yrs ago and I have it in my garage now. I think I will try to hook it up, but it is huge!!!

I miss them for their reliability and the unique designs in their TV cabinets. Today's TV's barely last 2 yrs.

In the 80's and 90's Nipper was atop a building as you entered Baltimore City on the right hand side of 295N ! Last I heard it was in a warehouse in Baltimore City

At its peak in the 1970s, RCA employed 100,000 people, 35,000 of them in New Jersey. GE and Jack Welch bought RCA for $6 billion in 1986 to reap the 20-30% net profits on NBC, the unexpected patent licensing net profits ($250 million annually), and the sale of other divisions for much more cumulatively than the company's purchase price: RCA Records to the German media giant BMG, Government Services to Martin Marietta (now Lockheed, which also acquired Astro-Electronics), Solid-State to Harris Semiconductor, Globcom (the original Marconi business) to MCI (and then Worldcom), Americom satellite communications to Luxembourg's SES, and the Consumer Electronics Division to the French company Thomson in exchange for its medical imaging technologies in 1987. Since then Thomson in the last five years sold off its businesses in color picture tubes, color TV, and consumer electronics to Indian and Chinese companies: all that's left is that brandname that it licenses.

The David Sarnoff Library (http://www.davidsarnoff.org) is grateful to Thomson for a license to reproduce the Nipper and old "meatball" RCA logo on clothing and other items at its Cafepress store, http://www.cafepress.com/davidsarnoff/4280920.

As for diversification, as major shareholders in mutual and pension funds dislike cyclical earnings, Robert Sarnoff tried to offset those cycles in consumer electronics and semiconductors by investing in Hertz, Coronet, and Swanson in particular. It worked but it also choked off reinvestment in semiconductors or consumer electronics, where RCA had the lead in the now universally used CMOS microchips and integrated circuits; LCDs; and personal computers, well before Apple or IBM.

best,
Alex Magoun, Executive Director
David Sarnoff Library

His Master's Voice was started The Gramophone Company, Ltd., in 1899 by one of the Victor Talking Machine's business partners, William Barry Owen. RCA assumed the Victor stakes in the British and Japanese spin-offs (JVC, Japan Victor Corporation)in 1929 and sold them in the mid-1930s during the Depression.

The main story above doesn't mention that RCA was based in Camden, NJ; was one of 3 major industries that helped Camden grow into a major city (the other 2 were Campbell Soup Co. & Esterbrook Pen).
The story mentions how RCA diversified into other products. I worked at RCA in defense electronics. We worked on a federally-funded project named BMEWS (Ballistic Missile Early Warning System). In fact, our plant--in Moorestown, NJ--had a radar system model covered from sight by what looked like a giant golf ball!
Yep, RCA has a lot of history!!

My parents had an RCA product in the 1950's, an automatic washing machine with a special "suds saver" option allowing the soapy water to wash more than one load of wash. There was even a blue ultraviolet light said to sanatize the clothes.

The interesting part of the RCA association was that it was an "RCA Whirlpool" name. The advertising jingle to market the product still sticks in my mind today.

Don't you just miss the "good ole days"?

IT SHOULD ALSO BE REMEMBEREED THAT RCA PAID ABOUT TEN MILLION TO BE TOLD BY AN "EXPERT" THAT THE OLD RCA LOGO WITH THE SPARKS UNDERNEATH AND OUR NIPPER WERE OBSOLETE AND WE HAD TO DO AWAY WITH ALL DOCUMENTS WITH THE OLD LOGO AND THE NIPPER STATUES AND ALL PRODUCTS THAT CONTAINED THEM WORLDWIDE. AUDITORS WERE TRAINED TO LOOK FOR SUCH ITEMS AT ALL LOCATIONS....TEN YEARS LATER A SURVEY OF MOST REMEMBERED LOGOS DISCOVERED THAT NIPPER WAS AMONG THE MOST REMEMBERED THOUGH OUT OF SITE ALL THOSE YEARS AND SO BACK HE CAME MUCH TO TO DELIGHT OF THOSE OF US EMPLOYED. I WAS WITH RCA SERVICE COMPANY FOR 38 YEARS, AM RETIRED FOR 24 YEARS AND STILL MISS THE PEOPLE BUT NIPPER IS EVERYWHERE TO BE SEEN IN MY HOME IN ONE FORM OR ANOTHER ...STATUES , PAINTINGS ETC

I worked for RCA Service company at a SAGE defense facility in Duluth MN, from 1959-1960.

Sorry, Nipper is a Fox Terrier NOT a Jack Russell. They are similar in some ways but they are very distinct breeds.

Jack Russell Owner

Wow! fabulous article things started with GE and ended with GE.
My Dad worked for RCA for many years and finally one of my sisters said he should retire and he did but I can remember going down to the branch on Schaffer when I was a kid and if I could get a new/ or used bright red RCA pencil I was in heaven and a ink pen well that was the ultimate. It was nice to see all the hustle and bustle there and seemed to me that it was one big family...I think the people there thought the same...so sad that this type of American company is now gone and remains in name only. growing up I remember RCA to be the Cadillac of electronics. I know that in spite of the sometime complaints my Dad made from time to time that he really enjoyed his job and was good at it as well. He worked on the road going to houses and business's doing repairs and adjustments.

I once saw a print of an English painting from the Victorian period in which the dog we now call Nipper and the gramophone, both in the familiar pose, are perched atop a coffin. The caption, "His Master's Voice", clearly communicates that the now dead master's voice is so clear and distinct from the gramophone, the dog is confused and believes his master is inside the horn.

There was no mention of the Victor Talking Machine Company on this painting. I don't know whether the painting was commissioned by VTM and printed to be used in store displays of its machines, or whether it predated the company and was adopted by it for marketing purposes.

Has anyone else seen this painting?

Here's a website that attempts to answer my question.

http://petcaretips.net/rca-nipper.html

However, the photo shown has clearly been cropped in an attempt to squelch the coffin "rumor". The print I saw at an antique shop was huge...probably 4ft tall by 8ft wide. Nipper and the machine were clearly sitting on a coffin. Not a table, not a bench. A coffin. And "His Master's Voice" was painted in elegant caligraphy (I believe in gold) at the bottom of the painting.

Also RCA ran the Cape Kennedy/Canaveral system and put all those satilites up there for other companies (I had my 25th year award there at the base). The history of RCA and the demise by GE was a sad ocassion for all of us. They also competed with IBM in the Computer industries and was the largest Tax Writeoff (at the time) in the history of the U.S. The first patent of color broadcasting was RCA with it's 'one neck, three gun' color tube. It just goes on and on about RCA.

I also attended RCA Institutes and was technical for 12 years but transfered into District sales to Lodging and Hosp. Industries for 20 years until retirement in the buyout. General Zarnoff (the first President or CEO) was the Ham Radio operator that intercepted the distress call of the Titanic. They were also in carpet business (Corenet) as well as Two Way Radio for awhile and competed with IBM in the computer business until went busted and was the biggest TAX writeoff at the time in the history of U.S.