How the dog ate the EMI horn

David K. Nelson says:

The convoluted story of Francis Barraud’s famous painting of his dog, but not this “dog bites horn” aspect, is told in Roland Gelatt’s 1954 book, The Fabulous Phonograph. In 1899 Barraud visited The Gramophone Company’s office to borrow a brass horn so he could update an older painting showing his fox terrier listening to an Edison machine — that’s the only reason the painting became associated with the record industry. Gelatt is careful to note that the dog had died year’s earlier in 1895. Presumably NOT from ingesting bits of the old Edison black japanned horn.

The original idea of course was that the voice of a dog’s master could readily emerge from a recordable cylinder talking machine. Once the “pre-recorded” cylinder or shellac disc was the favored medium the likelihood of a dog’s master having made a talking record for a commercial firm was pretty slim.