From 8-year old Hilda’s diary:
Today, Grandmother took me to call on some people who have a phonograph. They have a nice cat and I got to play with her, I think it’s a her. The record they played is called “The Battle of Santiago.” It was a real battle and we could hear the drums and bugles and the wounded horses and the wounded soldiers and I began to scream the way I always do when I am scared, so they stopped the record and played another, and I stopped screaming. The other record was “Ave Maria” on the violin. What a difference a record can make. I can’t understand anyone wanting to listen to a battle like that, or any other battle.
Perhaps the links above to recordings from the Library of Congress are the very records Hilda listened to.