A woman born in Milmont Park produced thousands of records for RCA Victor and was a rarity, a woman in the American record industry, writes Neil Genzlinger for The New York Times.

Ethel Gabriel died March 23 in Rochester, N.Y. She was 99.

She started with RCA as a record tester at its Camden plant in 1940.

“If it was a hit,” she told The Pocono Record in 2007, “I got to know every note because I had to play it over and over and over.”

A trombone player with her own dance band, her music skills earned her responsibility and a role in shaping music in the American record industry.

She was at the 1955 meeting when RCA signed Elvis Presley.

She was involved in “Cherry Pink and Apple Blossom White,” the 1955 instrumental hit by Perez Prado that started the U.S. mambo craze.

In 1959, she created a multi-million dollar line, the “Living Strings” easy-listening albums.

She also repackaged RCA archive material into the “Pure Gold” series.

Gabriel shared a 1983 Grammy Award for best historical album for “The Tommy Dorsey-Frank Sinatra Sessions.” 

She was vice president of RCA by the time she left in 1983, leaving her mark on the American record industry.

Read more at The New York Times about Ethel Gabriel.