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But to people of a certain age, the inductee who brought them the most pleasure is Peter Goldmark, inventor of the LP.

Staff writer Michael E.

Young, who has a couple thousand LPs in his collection, explains what the iPod generation missed out on.

Six decades ago, Columbia Records forever changed the way the world listened to music.But talk about a low-key revolution.

The very first LP – or long-playing record – arrived on June 28, 1948.

Mendelssohn's Concerto in E Minor came wrapped in a thin, blue-green cardboard envelope, decorated with a sketch of a leaning Greek column, a design disparagingly known as "the tombstone."I found my copy at an estate sale in Farmers Branch for $2.

And in a world content with manipulated digits squished and squeezed into tiny plastic boxes, this lovely 12-inch slab of vinyl still provides the true glory of the music, in pure, unadulterated analog.The LP's extended form – up to 22 minutes per side, enough to put most symphonies on a single record – opened the door for all sorts of musical possibilities.Without that format, there would have been no "concept album" – no Sgt.

Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, no London Calling, no Blonde on Blonde, certainly no 17 minutes of the stoned-drone of "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida."A...

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