Shown here is an ad for phonographs from the Nightingale Mfg. Co. of 422-26 Armour Street, Chicago.  The ad, which appeared a hundred years ago this month in the June 1918 issue of Talking Machine World, describes the Nightingale as “the highest quality machine offered to the American public.”

But despite the laudatory description, Nightingale apparently never caught on. It is relegated to this listing of hundreds of “off brand” phonographs of the era.

There is a collection of a set of photos of a nicely preserved Nightingale phonograph at this link.  The nameplate on this phonograph indicates that the Nightingale was manufactured by H.B. Wolper & Co.  Assuming it’s the same H.B. Wolper, one of the principals caught the ire of the Federal Trade Commission a few years later regarding the way mail-order groceries were advertised.