the swastika finds an unlikely home

In the early days of electrical recording (recording with the microphone started in 1925), companies around the world used an American system of disc cutting patented in America by Western Electric. Every recording made involved a payment to the company, so London-based HMV, or The Gramophone Company, developed its own system, which both improved on the American original and avoided royalty payments. It came in around 1931. Every 78 cut had a unique matrix number engraved onto the disc between the playing surface and the label. This ensured that the master disc could always be found and distinguished. 78s made with the Westrex system as it was called used a triangle. HMV decided to use the swastika to distinguish the new, Blumlein system, as the picture above shows. Political considerations soon moved them to change it to a square marking.