Charles H. Templeton

           "This is my hunting and fishing," Templeton says, describing his passion for gathering the instruments and musical paraphernalia. "Music has been very much a part of my life since I can remember. Music is a language which has no barriers and has its own power. It creates the mood for funerals and weddings, churches, victories in war, romance," adds Templeton. who played the oboe and piccolo in the MSU Famous Maroon Band. Underneath eyebrows which slant inward and downward like white accent marks, Templeton's smoke gray eyes narrow like those of a predatory bird as he tells about the capture of some of the pieces in the collection. 

          His safari began with the purchase of a Victor IV. "My wife and I were sitting in a little coffee shop in Birmingham, Ala., and I saw this beautiful Victor. It was in a mahogany case and had a big mahogany horn. I thought to myself, 'Why did they make this look like a nice piece of furniture' " Templeton tells, recalling the first of the many questions he would ask about the music business during the next 40 years. Again answering his own question, he explains that at some point the record player became more than just a machine and its owners wanted something impressive to display as well as an instrument on which to play their records. Therefore, he notes, consumer desires again produced a change in the music business. 

          Templeton's fingers tap a restless rhythm on the desk as he tells of finding a model of the elusive Johnson A one of the first machines to play discs being used as a doorstop in a shop in Hagerstown, Md.  "I'm looking at it and hoping I know enough that it really is what I think it is. I talked to the shop owner and he is willing to sell it, and I get it out to the car and rub the dirt off of the little metal plate on the back and, sure enough, there the name is," he recalls with the smile of a businessman remembering the success of a make-you or break-you deal. 

          With little time for traveling, Templeton pursues many of the pieces over the phone, which makes for its own excitement. "You buy it sight unseen and are trusting this person. I remember in the instance of the player organ, I was worried about whether it would be what I wanted. It wasn't until they unloaded it from the delivery truck that I saw it was everything I had expected." Although he repairs the machines himself, Templeton says, "I want them in the original shape and in the original way they were used. I don't want pieces that have to be refinished. Every piece in the collection, except for a couple, is in its original condition. " And, the reward for the years spent capturing "The Business of Music," admits the collector.