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THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW
The Association Banquet at Delmonico's.
After an elaborate menu had been dis-
cussed at length, Adolpho H. Fischer, at the
request of the toast-master, Handel Pond,
read letters of regret from E. P. Hawkins,
president of Canadian Association; E. H.
Droop, William Bolderwick, Louis Dede-
rick, H. E. Krehbiel and Henry Howland.
Then the retiring president, Mr. Pond, said:
REMARKS OF HANDEL FOND.
This banquet, the fourth in the history of the
National. Piano Manufacturers' Association,
is, from every point of view, the most im-
portant gathering that has ever taken place
in our industry, and it makes a new record
in our trade annals. As it is, our first gath-
ering in the new century, there is a peculiar
fitness in celebrating it here, in the metrop-
olis of the new world—the place of its
birth.
The Association felicitates itself upon the
honor and privilege of entering as its
guests the piano dealers of the United States.
That you have so generally accepted the
invitation of our Association to meet us
in conference, to discuss matters of mutual
interest, responding to such a cordial spirit
.to help make this the most successful con-
vention we have ever held, is a source of
gratification to every member of our Asso-
ciation. From this moment till the end of
our festivities, let us forget every care, every
"abuse," every "evil," (if piano men can
have any such) and may happiness and joy
reign supreme!
It is running no risk to give thanks in
advance to the New York Association and
others of the piano trade in this city for
their hospitality in so generously providing
for our entertainment on the morrow. While
the fund provided for this purpose is some-
what less than the capitalization of the
United States Steel Trust, I understand it
was largely over-subscribed, and like the
new English loan, allotment is to be made
pro rata.
Gentlemen of the New York Piano Man-
ufacturers' Association, and all who have so
liberally contributed of their time and money
to entertain our Association and our guests,
we thank you most heartily.
The trade press, who have so generously
placed their columns at the disposal of our
Association, are also entitled to our thanks.
We fully appreciate their efforts to make
this convention and banquet successful. Our
coadjutors, for such the trade press may be
called, have almost, without exception,
worked in harmony with us, and we recog-
nize the advantage of their assistance so
cheerfully rendered.
The beginning of the twentieth century
finds our country more generously prosper-
ous than it has been at any previous time
in its history. Labor of all kinds is well
employed and probably is receiving better
pay than in any other country in the world.
We have been favored with abundant crops
which have netted the farmers good prices,
enabling them to pay off their different
forms of indebtedness and leaving them a
surplus with which to purchase luxuries or
lay by for a rainy clay. With industries in
full activity and our farmers selling their
products to advantage, it is natural that
business along commercial and mercantile
lines should be of record-breaking propor-
tions. These favorable conditions have been
existent for several years, and are largely
responsible for the satisfactory condition
which the United States is now in, from an
industrial and financial point of view.
If any industry is dependent upon the
national prosperity, it surely is that of mak-
ing and selling pianos, as our product is
largely in the line of luxury. There is,
probably, no problem which more deeply con-
cerns those of cautious turn of mind than
that of forecasting the future prosperity of
our country. We must all make plans for
the transaction of business in the future,
and it is desirable to plan broadly, for living
from day to day is uneconomical and unwise
from any standpoint, except that of neces-
sity in cases of unusual emergency. The
most profitable employment for highly de-
veloped judgment is to discern future events
with the largest degree of accuracy. As
our education for successful forecasting
must, of necessity, come from familiarity
with the past, let us consider as to the pos-
sibilities of a continuance of our present
most favorable conditions, in which the piano
trade has been more highly prosperous than
ever before.
W T e shall, of course, as in the past, see
ups and downs, have seasons of good and
bad crops. We are not justified by experience
in expecting continuously such highly fav-
orable agricultural conditions as have existed
during the past few years; that is to say,
such bountiful crops and such high prices
together. But the world is depending on
us more largely every year for its sup-
plies of grains, meats, cotton, and other
physical necessities of life; and, as we have
in the past been able to produce these com-
modities to better advantage than others,
undoubtedly, an increasing home consump-
tion together with export demands, will con-
tinue for the future to further develop our
agricultural industries.
Our fertility in invention, our proficiency
as manufacturers, is making us increasing-
ly serious competitors for our foreign rivals,
and we are unceasingly enlarging our in-
fluence abroad. The rapidity of the increase
in our exports of manufactured goods,
while a source of gratification to us, is strik-
ing terror to the hearts of competitors across
the sea, who find their calculations badly up-
set and interfered with.
In 1875 we were the fourth in the list of
nations in the value of exports. England,
France and Germany leading us in the order
named. In that year England exported
goods to the value of over a billion dollars;
France, three-quarters as much; Germany,
considerably over half a billion, and the
United States slightly over that figure. In
1900 the United States led in the value of
its exports, the world buying of us nearly
a billion and a half; Great Britain selling
slightly less, with Germany and France far
in the rear. (Applause.) During the last'
twenty-five years the records of increase in
exports gives France five per cent., Great
Britain 34 per cent., Germany 73 per cent.,
and the United States 192 per cent. (Ap-
plause. As our exports are increasing at
a more rapid rate than ever before, it is
reasonable to expect that these favorable
conditions will continue, with occasional in-
terruptions, along the same ratio of increase.
So attractive have American "bargain coun-
ters" become to the rest of the world that
merchants and manufacturers in foreign
countries find their market fast slipping
away from them, and it has been seriously
proposed by European economists that, for
self-protection, they combine to hinder or
boycott the rapid progress of their youthful
competitor.
We shall, undoubtedly, have seasons of
comparative depression, but the present won-
derful prosperity is but a foretaste of what
is before us. "In the twinlding of an fve. 4 '
by what seems but a single leap, the United
States has passed from comparative obscur-
ity to the position of the leading commercial
nation of the world. Per capita, we are the
largest consumers, the greatest producers,
the most lavish spenders, and, either collec-
tively or individually, the richest people on
the face of the globe. (Applause.) And
New York rivals London as a financial cen-
ter of the world. But a few years ago we
were so deeply indebted to European cap-
italists as to cause apprehension in their
minds, as well as in the minds of our West-
ern farmers. To-day these debts have been
largely paid, our securities returned, and we
are lending England, Germany and Russia
millions of pounds sterling to pay for their
indulgence of the passion of war.
For a side issue and a little diversion, we
have indulged in a couple of wars ourselves,
winning victories over one of the oldest of
the European nations and over one of its
rebellious colonies, and yet, to-day, we have
the largest accumulation of gold in our na-
tional treasury ever held by us, or with one
exception, by any other nation in the world's
history. This record is an anti-toxine for
the bacillus of pessimism, and the pessimist
must curl up and quit. Gentlemen, what a
glorious privilege that our citizenship is cast
in a country so extravagantly prosperous,
and with opportunities unfolding almost
faster than the mind can grasp and under-
stand their immensity; in a land where ra-
tional freedom and tolerance are secured to
all, where the only worldly crowns of honor
are worn by those winning successes of in-
dustry, achievements of science or art;
where a man is esteemed for what he accom-
plishes rather than for his inheritance of
name, or the fact that a ticketed strain of
blood courses through his veins. (Applause.)
John A. Van Wormer, the President of the
N. Y. A : C , made a most interesting speech
upon the advantages of organization.
Mr. Van Wormer was followed by the
Hon. Frank J. Kilpatrick, of Alabama, who
spoke tp "A Voice from the South." He
made an entertaining speech and told a humor-
ous story which was heartily applauded.
CONSTANTIN VON STERNBERO'S SPEECH.
Mr. Von Sternberg: Gentlemen, I hope
you will not doubt the sincerity of my words
when I say to you that this is one of the
grandest and happiest moments of my life,
effusive as it may appear. Several who are
here present will no doubt appreciate the
fervency of my emotions when I confess to
you that as Mr. President has kindly revealed,
1 am a pianist. I have always suspected
myself to be one, and the kindness of New
York's critics has corroborated that suspicion.
Well, we pianists are very tender plants.
W r e have that in common with a good woman,
that as a good woman is supposed to have
speech with only one man, that is, at a time,
so we pianists are supposed to have speech
only with the one piano manufacturer and no
more (Laughter). And now imagine the
effect upon my soul to have you here all in
one room in a bunch, with the privilege of
taiking to you all at the same time. Why,
Gentlemen, this is glorious ! This is grand !
It is more—it is pie (Laughter and applause).
As you have heard people enumerate here
to-night, a great many things of which the
United States can be justly proud, I should
like to point out one article to which the
whole civilized world has bowed unanimously
in admiration—one- article of manufacture
which the whole civilized world has readily