I Apologize / Fight For California: Museum Object and Cultural History

The object in the museum catalogue

Phil Spitalny's Orchestra. I Apologize (track 1) Fight For California (track 2) (Hit of the Week K4). 78 rpm.

Hit of the Week Records was an American record label introduced in 1930. The company manufactured and sold low-priced records made of Durium, a flexible synthetic resin coated on a brown paper base, rather than typical records made of shellac.

A new Hit of The Week record was released usually every Thursday every week and was sold in newsstands across the country. The single-faced records originally sold for 15 cents each and had reached 20 cents by the end of the production in 1932.

Popular musicians of the day who recorded for Hit of the Week include Duke Ellington and his Orchestra (under the pseudonym Harlem Hot Chocolates), Rudy Vallée, Eddie Cantor, Ralph Kirbery, Helen Rowland, Vincent Lopez, Joe Venuti, Sam Lanin, and Phil Spitalny.

Hit of the Week recordings feature U. S. Patent #1915384, dated June 27, 1933 by Joseph Reilly and Hal T. Beans assignors, by Mesne assignments, to Durium Products Corporation for a method of making phonograph records.

Materials, dates and provenance

• date made: 1931
• recording artist: Phil Spitalny's Orchestra
• manufacturer: Durium Products Incorporated
• Object Name: sound recording
• Physical Description: paper (overall material)
• Physical Description: resin (overall material)
• Measurements: overall: 9 1/2 in; x 24.13 cm
• place made: United States: New York, New York
• ID Number: 1980.0185.02
• maker number: K4
• accession number: 1980.0185
• catalog number: 1980.0185.02
• Credit Line: Gift of John C. and Margaret E. Ewers
• Data Source: National Museum of American History

Sources and reuse

Catalogue descriptions and facts adapted from National Museum of American History through the Smithsonian's official Open Access dataset. This record explicitly marks its metadata CC0 1.0; formatting and selection have been changed.