Early Life and Professional Career
Babson was the son of Augustus "Gus" Babson and Laura Margaret (Davis). He was born in Massachusetts in 1875 and grew up in Seward County, Nebraska.
He made the acquaintance of fellow Nebraskan, Leon Douglass, who at the time worked for the Nebraska Phonograph Company. Douglass was an inventor and patented a number of improvements to the phonograph and was a pioneer in the development of color technology for film. After moving to Chicago, Babson first worked at the World's Fair for $1 a day, possibly in Douglass' slot phonograph concession (Douglass had invented a coin-slot attachment for the phonograph, creating the immediate predecessor to the jukebox). He then obtained work from Douglass, who by then had become a manager of the Chicago Central Phonograph Company, which was part of the Thomas Edison-affiliated North American Phonograph Company, distributor for the Edison Phonograph. Babson's starting salary was $15 a week and he was a cashier. For a brief time, at Douglass' direction, he also worked in San Francisco, running a slot phonograph concession and a parlor, which he then sold in 1895, at Douglass' direction, to Peter Bacigalupi, a pioneer of early music recordings, and the business became known as "Edison's Kinetoscope, Phonograph and Graphophone Arcade."
Babson returned to Chicago and continued to rise in the sound recording sales industry. Beginning in 1903, he traveled worldwide, including China, Russia, the Far East and Europe as a representative for the Victor Talking Machine Company, selling over $100,000 worth of phonographs. Later, with his brothers, Fred and Gus, he started the Babson Brothers Company in Chicago, a mercantile and catalog mail order company similar to Sears, Roebuck and Company, which was a major seller of the Edison Phonograph, as well as Babson Records, Burlington watches, clothing, shoes, and farm supplies. He also became a director of the Talking Machine Company of Chicago and then a major stockholder in the Victor Talking Machine Company, of which his mentor Leon Douglass was the first Vice-President. Victor was the manufacturer of the highly successful Victrola phonograph player. The company was eventually acquired by RCA. Due to his success in business and investments, Babson was able to travel internationally and ultimately fulfilled his dream of owning purebred Arabian horses.
Read more about this topic: Henry Babson
Famous quotes containing the words early, life, professional and/or career:
“I doubt that I would have taken so many leaps in my own writing or been as clear about my feminist and political commitments if I had not been anointed as early as I was. Some major form of recognition seems to have to mark a woman’s career for her to be able to go out on a limb without having her credentials questioned.”
—Ruth Behar (b. 1956)
“Do you know, Valerio, that even the least among all humans is so great that life is far too short to love him?”
—Georg Büchner (1813–1837)
“Smoking ... is downright dangerous. Most people who smoke will eventually contract a fatal disease and die. But they don’t brag about it, do they? Most people who ski, play professional football or drive race cars, will not die—at least not in the act—and yet they are the ones with the glamorous images, the expensive equipment and the mythic proportions. Why this should be I cannot say, unless it is simply that the average American does not know a daredevil when he sees one.”
—Fran Lebowitz (b. 1950)
“Clearly, society has a tremendous stake in insisting on a woman’s natural fitness for the career of mother: the alternatives are all too expensive.”
—Ann Oakley (b. 1944)