FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Date of Release: June 17, 2011
The sale will also feature prototype examples of two “canned laughter” machines used in early television shows.
ORANGE, Calif. – Exquisite antiques, fine furniture and objets d’art from several southern California estates will merge with the final offering of Continental furniture and decorations from the Steven Thomas antiques firm at Don Presley’s June 25-26 auction. In addition, the 1,100-lot sale will shine a spotlight on two technological inventions that dramatically impacted American pop culture – the original machines created to produce “canned” laughter and audience applause for Hollywood’s booming television industry of the 1950s.
Two talented inventors, Charles Rolland Douglass and Jess Oppenheimer, a CBS sound engineer and developer/producer of I Love Lucy , simultaneously created artificial laughter and applause machines for use with television comedies and game shows in the early 1950s. Douglass filed for the patent on his “Laffbox” before Oppenheimer could file for his on the “Jayo Laugher.” In 1954 Douglass’s “LaffBox” went on to become the provider of canned audience laughter and applause for more than 20,000 TV shows over several decades.
Examples of both machines will be presented for sale. Each of the trailblazing recording devices is a prototype, developed at around the same time and with a similar purpose in mind: to house a library of sounds – specifically “canned” laughter and audience applause – for use during the taping of television shows.
The sale’s principal estate collection comes from a magnificent home in Belmont Heights, an oceanfront enclave in Long Beach, California. Auctioneer Presley explained that the owner has sold his residence and is relocating to his country property – a 500-acre ranch in Santa Barbara where he raises rare Peruvian horses.
Towering over the featured collection is a pair of majestic cast-iron figures, classically formed as a Native-American man and woman holding torches aloft. The imposing torcheres dominated a reception area that also held a Steinway grand piano and what auctioneer Don Presley calls “some of the finest French furniture [he has] ever seen.”
But at 92 inches tall and of a weight so substantial it takes four strong men to move even one of them, the statues will not be making the move to the country.
“The consignor’s Santa Barbara home is no less spectacular than the one he is leaving, but the décor is very different,” Presley said. “It’s a ranch house that doesn’t really suit these pieces, which belong in a grand setting.”
The torcheres stand on Doric pedestals, each bearing a tag inscribed with the manufacturer’s name: Fonderies du Val d’Osne, 58 Bd. Voltaire, Paris. Established in 1836 by Jean-Pierre Victor Andre, the Val d’Osne foundry distinguished itself throughout the Victorian Era with its award-winning designs of both functional and ornamental cast iron.
Presley has estimated the torcheres – which will be offered as a single lot – at $40,000-$70,000. Those numbers could prove conservative, however. On May 5, Sotheby’s auctioned a comparable pair of Val d’Osne Native-American figures for $86,500. The only differences were in height and base motif – the Sotheby’s figures stood 9 ft. tall and had ornately decorated as opposed to understated Doric-style pedestals.
The opulent furnishings from the Belmont Heights estate include two Louis XVI vitrines, one of them crafted from oak and adorned with bronze ormolu; a Louis XVI hand-carved and gilded, marble-topped entry table; and a marble-topped Italian Renaissance Revival wash stand of bird’s-eye maple and other exotic woods ($2,000-$5,000). A circa-1880 French intaglio table ($4,000-$6,000) is decorated with carved corner figures, each having a different facial expression.
A 12-piece French walnut dining suite ($12,000-$18,000) comprised of a table, eight cane-back chairs, buffet and two matching hutches is richly carved with a lion-mask motif. “This elegant set will actually fit almost any dining room,” Presley noted. “It’s not monumental; the tallest items – the hutches – top out at just over seven feet.”
From the estate’s gentleman’s study comes a 4-piece set ($8,000-$12,000) consisting of a 19th-century leather-topped walnut desk carved with images of lions, griffins and ladies’ heads; plus three chairs. Other carved-furniture highlights include a superb French entry or library table with griffins hewn into the legs, an 1880s Liege (France) oak Bible cabinet with the carved image of a lamb, and a pair of 1910 Gothic Revival church pews.
An extraordinary artwork to be auctioned is the 69-inch-long whale with calf ($4,000-$7,000) carved from exotic woods and acquired at great cost in Hawaii some 25 years ago. “This is a unique item of utmost quality,” said Presley. “Its composition and the way the flippers are highlighted are a testament to the artist’s skill.”
A pair of 19th-century Sevres gilt-bronze porcelain lidded urns came to Presley’s from a home in the Los Angeles neighborhood of Westwood. Hallmarked and signed “E. Collot,” each of the urns measures 29 inches to the top of the finial.
A Charles Shepard Chapman (American, 1879-1962) oil-on-board autumn landscape with a railroad theme was obtained from a home in Newport Beach, California. Educated at Pratt Institute and William Merritt Chase’s New York School of Art, Chapman was an accomplished painter and illustrator whose work shows the influence of Frederic Remington. Measuring 30 x 52 inches, the landscape is estimated at $4,000-$9,000. Another artwork of note is C.H. Chapin’s (American, 1864-1904) 30 x 36-inch oil on canvas depicting cattle watering in a cove ($800-$1,200).
Chinese ivory has gained an avid following in Presley’s sales. The June 25-26 event includes a set of eight intricately carved ivory Immortals ($12,000-$20,000), as well as a 38-inch-wide tusk fastidiously carved and pierced to create a “bridge” ($8,000-$9,500).
The auction contains many other items of exceptional quality from Santa Monica, Palm Springs, Palm Desert and Beverly Hills residences, including fine clocks, a Steinway & Sons baby grand piano with bench ($12,000-$18,000), a 25-inch-tall Eugene Delaplanche (French, 1836-1891) gilt-detailed bronze on rouge marble base ($8,000-$15,000), and a Maria Szantho (Hungarian, 1898-1984) oil painting of Pan with three nude nymphs.
ABOUT THE LAUGH MACHINES:
The caliber of antiques in Don Presley’s June 25-26 sale is expected to ignite serious bidding, but watch the mood lighten when two circa-1953 American pop-culture icons are presented at the podium: Charles Rolland Douglass’s “LaffBox” and the “Jayo Laugher” invented by I Love Lucy’s legendary creator/producer Jess Oppenheimer.
Each of the trailblazing recording devices is a prototype, developed at around the same time and with a similar purpose in mind: to house a library of sounds – specifically “canned” laughter and audience applause – for use during the taping of television shows.
The thigh-slapping history of the two laugh machines crossed paths earlier this year when Don Presley publicly announced he would be auctioning the “Laffbox” in his May sale. Discovered in a storage locker, the LaffBox came with a thick, neatly organized binder that documented its origin and use over the years. Based on the contents of the binder, Presley believed the LaffBox to be unique and publicized it as such.
Shortly after news of the LaffBox discovery was made public, Presley was contacted by the late Jess Oppenheimer’s son, Gregg Oppenheimer, who informed the auctioneer that his father had invented a machine whose origin may have pre-dated the LaffBox. It was known as the Jayo Laugher.
It seems that while Jess Oppenheimer (1913-1988) was openly developing his Jayo Laugher in 1953, a CBS Radio sound engineer named Charlie Douglass (1910-2003) was also quietly developing a similar device, which he dubbed the LaffBox.
Had he known a competing machine was in the works, Oppenheimer might have placed a greater priority on the completion of his Jayo Laugher, but he did not learn of the LaffBox’s existence until reading about it in a newspaper article. At that point, the race was on.
As reported in the Dec. 16, 1954 issue of the show business publication Variety, Oppenheimer and Douglass waged a neck-and-neck battle over which of their devices would receive a critically important U.S. Patent. In the end, the LaffBox prevailed over the Jayo Laugher, presumably because Douglass’s patent application had been filed first.
At that point, Oppenheimer abandoned his Jayo Laugher project. But his ingenious prototype – described as being capable of emitting “yocks ranging from snickers to giggles” to laughs of all lengths and intensity, “plus sundry variations of each” – remained in the Oppenheimer family archive.
Douglass’s LaffBox, on the other hand, went on to become the provider of canned audience laughter and applause for more than 20,000 TV shows over several decades.
“Anyone who has ever watched a comedy show on television has probably heard sounds from the LaffBox’s repertoire,” said Presley. “Charlie Douglass knew he had something special. He was very secretive about its inner workings and guarded it with his life. He kept it padlocked when it wasn’t in use.” Douglass traveled throughout the world with his LaffBox, Presley said, running its controls for all types of productions, from sitcoms to telethons, major sports events and even beauty pageants.
Now these two technological marvels of television history – the Jayo Laugher and the LaffBox – are coming together under one roof, to be auctioned in Don Presley’s June 25-26 sale as individual lots.
Gregg Oppenheimer is a prominent attorney who, like his sister Jo, has an ownership stake in I Love Lucy. Gregg and Jo are generously donating the entire proceeds from the sale of Jayo Laugher to the Motion Picture & Television Fund. This organization was created by film luminaries such as Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks and D.W. Griffith to provide assistance to members of the entertainment industry who are in need of a helping hand. To ensure every penny goes to the MPTF, Don Presley Auctions is waiving both the auction commission and the buyer’s premium on the sale of the Jayo Laugher.
As for the LaffBox, it has already had a successful test run before an auction audience. At his May sale, Presley had bidders laughing – real laughs – as he experimented with the machine. “When someone won a piece, I’d hit the button for applause,” Presley said. “If I told a dumb joke and no one laughed, I could hit another button and avoid embarrassment. It’s actually an auctioneer’s best friend.”
But all jokes aside, Presley said the two laugh machines are undeniably important relics of broadcasting history.
“Canned laughter may be electronic now, but these two mechanical prototypes were pioneers in their time. Both should be in the Smithsonian or some other museum that has an American pop culture or 20th-century technology collection.”
For additional information, call 714-633-2437 or email info@donpresleyauction.com. Visit Don Presley Auctions online at www.donpresleyauction.com.
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Closeup of one of a pair of figural cast-iron torcheres of a Native-American man and woman, 19th century, Fonderies du Val d’Osne, Paris; each 92 inches tall. Est. $40,000-$70,000 the pair. Don Presley Auctions Image.
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