Robert Louis Carleton
Born: November 8, 1894 or 1896, Missouri, USA
Died: July 13, 1956, Burbank, CA, USA


Bob Carleton is best known for writing the jazz classic "Ja-da" in 1918, but in later years he got into the "song-poem" business -- Recording Company of Los Angeles, or RECOLA, was his company.

RECOLA placed ads in publications across the country soliciting song lyrics to fill the supposedly high demand for new songs. Just about everybody who sent in anything got back an offer to set the lyrics to music, copyright it, and record a demonstration record, for various fees. Anyone who accepted the deal was then offered a contract whereby RECOLA would pay 2-cents per record sold, if RECOLA decided to press records.

So, this is the RECOLA demonstration record Andrian H. Jones got back with a recording of the song-poem he'd submitted, "The Girl On The Barracks Wall". See photos for an idea of what a RECOLA contract looked like.