Steve Bentley speculates in yesterday's MMD about what kind of music
machines might have been aboard passenger ships in the days before
radio and phonograph.

The Spring 2005 issue of "Mechanical Music, Journal of the Musical Box
Society International" carried an article by Texas collector Steve
Boehck tracing some lost Welte orchestrions.  His text and illustrations
showed that some were aboard ships to provide entertainment for
passengers.

Coin-operated instruments might not have always been appropriate, but
I think that orchestrions and the like were to be found onboard as
often as pianos.

Matthew Caulfield
Irondequoit, New York