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Concerning the record in question, it is an acetate coated disc. Over the decades, this aacetate coating can flake off and it really isn't a good idea to try to clean one with anything wet. Also, these disc usually were not good for very many playings before the audio quality went south. My advice would be to copy the disc to another format, using a 3 mil stylus, with as few plays as possible.
There is an older lady in town, who's husband was a minister back in the '40's/'50's. She had tons of his old sermons that were recorded at a local radio station on 16" 33 1/3 rpm records. These records were an aluminum base with an acetate coating and I think most of them played from the inside out, unlike the majority of records that played from the outside in. She had not heard these records in ages and her old el cheapo califone transcription player had seen better days. I eventually found her a Garrard 301 turntable that had been set up to play these disc. I combined that TT with a BPC Pioneer receiver, cassette deck for transfer, and two speakers. Needless to say, she was very happy.
Concerning the 33 rpm record, there was one other use for them prior to the LP introduction in '48. Starting in 1934, the Library of Congress started issuing talking books for the blind on 12" 33 rpm records. They also loaned out special phonographs to play these records. I have an early spring driven talking book player that will handle 24 and 33 rpm (never have seen a 24 rpm record). And, I have an electric model that will play 33 rpm talking books and 78 rpm music records. The Library of Congress kept the 33 rpm talking book in service until the late '50's-early '60's. Then, they started using 16 rpm records for books. By the mid-to-late '60's, they started using 8 rpm records for their books and it was this speed that was used until the end of books and magazines on record in 2001.
I think I used to have one of the later Wilcox-Gay "Recordio" home record cutters. It was a suitcase model from around '50-'51, had a built in AM radio, had speeds of 33/45/78 rpm, and used the same tonearm for palyback as well as cutting. It had an oddball dual point stylus and for recording, the rear of the tonearm had to be lifted in order to place the stylus in the recording position.
I also have one of the older dual arm Recordio's; but, that one got busted to heck and back during shipping, due to a very poor packing job.
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