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warm glow spreads from the Oriental History Museum’s Wurlitzer these days. She seems to sit a bit more proudly, after some TLC and a winter’s workover. Still, the 60-year old jukebox from Red Lee’s Grill needs some more work to make it sing again.

All lit up, music waiting to go…

The jukebox had been a fixture at Red Lee’s hamburger restaurant for decades. Then one day in 1995, the music died. Red Lee’s daughter, Georgie Powell says, “it just quit playing.” When they tried to revive the jukebox back then, Georgie says, “we just couldn’t get any help with it.”

After her father passed away, Georgie Powell donated the jukebox to Oriental’s History Museum where it’s been on display ever since – even in silence, its lines draw attention, a memory for some, a reminder for younger visitors of those days way before you carried your music collection with you.

Wanting the Wurlitzer to be more than just a visual display, the museum has taken on that task of making the music play again. The challenge of course, is that it’s now two decades further away from those who might’ve been familiar with fixing them.

The Wurlitzer.

Last fall, TownDock.net readers responded to the call and donated hundreds of dollars to fix the relic. A new amplifier was bought and over the winter, volunteer Joe Valinoti worked on the jukebox in his garage. He made it so that the wires are safe. Joe says that various motors inside seem to work well individually and there don’t appear to be parts missing.

Some things in the sequence show signs of life.

“By backfeeding the record changer,” Valinoti says he could “get it to select a record, spin it and bring the tone arms over.”

One of the 45’s that it’s hoped, will one day swing over on its own and play.

The WUrlitzer is now back at the Museum and as Lou Ostendorff demonstrated the other day, if you drop a coin in the slot, you can hear a brief warble, as if something in there wants to engage. But it doesn’t.

Getting those various bits to connect is the task before Ostendorff now. An Oreintal history buff and member of the museum’s board, Lou is now working on the Wurlitzer — you can see him in there, tools laid out, on some days when the museum is open. (Think of it as performance art with a practical angle.)

Skywalker style, Lou Ostendorff is about to take on the inside of the Wurlitzer.

Lou Ostendorff suspects the problem may lurk way inside. “The reason it doesn’t play is probably because some mechanism is stuck, or broken.”

One hunch is that the innards of the Wurlitzer may not have been re-lubed since it was new, 6 decades ago and that a part inside there is, as Lou puts it technically, “clogged up with years of old, hard grease.”

“Disassembly will probably locate the problem. It is also the most time consuming part of the process.”

From the inside looking out.

There is a self-imposed deadline. Oriental’s History Museum is planning its First Annual Street Dance on Saturday October 11 (Columbus Day weekend) from 4-7p as an homage to the Oriental tradition of a street being given over to a dance. Lou Ostendorff is making it his mission to get the jukebox working by then, to make it “fully operational,” so that someone dropping a coin in the slot can see the mechanism work, select a song, and play it without any obvious problems.”

“We have a complete machine in relatively good condition. With a little luck and some quality time devoted to it, we should be able to get it running again.”

You can see the Wurlitzer — and on certain days the work being done — at the Oriental History Museum, which is open Fridays Friday 11 am – 3 pm, Saturday 1 – 4 pm and Sunday 1 – 4 pm. Admission to the Museum is always free and donations are gladly accepted for ongoing expenses of running the museum.

Posted Thursday April 3, 2014 by Melinda Penkava