Copyright © 2003-2010
Mechanical Music Press, et, al., All Rights Reserved
(Site History, Policies, Disclaimers and Permissions)
This web site is meant to be both educational and entertaining, with its construction and maintenance being a labor of love. It is the result of combining two formerly separate mechanical music endeavors. The first one was a web site started by Terry Hathaway in 1997, which was devoted to historical research and education relating to large mechanical music machines. This site later added audio recordings of certain rare and historic automatic musical instruments, so that it was possible for visitors to actually hear and enjoy the sound of mechanical music as it once existed during its long ago heyday. The second site, opened in 2002, operated by Art Reblitz and Tim Westman, was primarily intended to showcase Mr. Reblitz's latest book, The Golden Age of Automatic Musical Instruments, a 436-page masterpiece that showcases many spectacular automatic musical instruments from the collections of Robert Gilson, James Krughoff and Jasper Sanfilippo.
The marriage of these two formerly distinct web sites provides a more powerful and diverse stage for the presentation of mechanical music technology and its fascinating history, by uniting the compatible interests and enthusiasm of several people, each one participating in a complimentary and synergistic way. Art Reblitz, for instance, will have a ready platform to announce and distribute not only his currently in-print books, but can now look toward bringing out of the closet other writing projects and out-of-print materials and make them publicly accessible. Moreover, a Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) page will permit Mr. Reblitz to present submitted questions in a way that everyone can learn from and enjoy, while, at the same time, relieve him from having to answer the same type of question over and over again, thus giving him more time to create new and interesting publications.
Faith Westman will take care of the day to day aspects, such as preparing and shipping out book and audio recording orders, so that Mechanical Music Press customers can enjoy prompt and timely service for items purchased. Terry Hathaway, on the other hand, will act as webmaster, keeping the web site up to date, as well as be a contributing author for additional historical information as time and interest permits.
No visitor or customer preferential or address information that may be derived from access, mail order sales or any other kind of communication is shared, sold, rented or otherwise made available in any form to any outside person or entity.
Any contact information referenced within this site is (1) public information available elsewhere, (2) specifically authorized by the person or parties concerned, or is (3) shown for historical purposes and is functionally obsolete.
Some minimal information is routinely collected by the Internet Service Provider during Internet access, such as browser type and file access information. This information will occasionally be accessed to analyze usage trends so as to improve site layout and performance. No "cookies" are set or used by this site, but it is possible that the hosting service may set a cookie for reasons entirely unknown to the authors of this web site.
Any and all aspects of this site are subject to revision, correction, change and/or removal without prior notice or obligation to any person or entity. Diligence and a best effort to minimize inaccuracies within this site is ongoing, but, under no circumstances shall there be any guarantee or warrantee, either stated, inferred, construed or otherwise implied, regarding the authenticity, correctness or usefulness of any material contained within this site. It is essentially impossible, for instance, to verify beyond doubt portions of the historical material presented, due to dimmed memories and the often necessary reliance on hearsay, old stories and/or anecdotal evidence procured or offered through various sources. Therefore, anyone using and/or relying upon any information contained within this site does so at their own risk, and without recourse or remedy.
To report errors or offer suggestions please contact the webmaster at:
Throughout this web site certain text and graphic content, such as logos and personal photographs, have been made available for use within this site that are the copyrighted property of various individuals and/or other legal entities and therefore are restricted for use or reproduction elsewhere. However, permission is hereby granted to reproduce and use textual material within this site that is specifically not excerpted from a credited source, as long as such usage is for "fair and reasonable use," such as brief quotations embodied in articles and reviews, and a credit line is given. Please note that the absence of a credit line or copyright statement for a specific textual or graphic element DOES NOT guarantee or indicate any kind of implied or actual consent or permission to use, copy or otherwise reproduce this restricted copyright content.
If in doubt, please write the webmaster for permissions in regards to specific content at:
The term copyright © 2003 by Mechanical Music Press, et.al., means that the Mechanical Music Press is the underlying copyright holder for materials on this web site, but that the authors of certain published pieces retain their own individual copyright status, which takes precedence over the underlying blanket Mechanical Music Press copyright. The copyright holder of any particular page can be easily determined by simply viewing the page's source html code, and then observe the copyright meta tag located in the page header.
To do this, as an example, while browsing this page using Internet Explorer go to the View drop-down menu and click on Source. Then, once the source code is visible, examine the page header and find the meta tag that reads as follows:
<meta name="copyright" content="Copyright by Mechanical Music Press 2003">
Copyright © 2003-2010 by Mechanical Music Press, et.al.