Music Trade Review

Issue: 1908 Vol. 46 N. 7

Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
REVIEW
THE
fflMC TIRADE
10 CENTS.
VOL. XLVI. No. 7. Published Every Saturday by Edward Lyman Bill at 1 Madison Ave., New York, February 15,1908. SINGLE $S.OO COPIES,
PER VEAR.
"Is there a nation on earth where justice
is as slow as in the United States?
"Too much legislation cheapens the law.
And Not Busy Enough in Administering Them
"Too much legislation attenuates and impairs
Is the Very Pertinent Complaint of Congress-
the vigor of the law.
man Lovering—Truths Well Expressed.
"Fewer laws promptly a^nd vigorously enforced
Congressman W. C. Lovering recently delivered would diminish crime.
"What shall be said of the morals of a busi-
an interesting address which has attracted much
attention. The subject discussed by the congress- ness community when it practically demands as-
man was "Too Many Laws." He argued in favor surance that criminals shall not be arraigned,
of fewer laws more promptly and vigorously en- and when the assurance that a criminal will not
forced, and made the claim that there is more be prosecuted gives confidence in stock market
ability employed to break the laws than to make values?
"What shall be said of men who exult in the
them. Mr. Lovering said:
"While there is sufficient reverence in our immunity of the lawbreaker?
"What shall be said of men whose greed for
hearts to bring us to this honored spot, and to
move us to raise a monument to commemorate gain has so blunted their consciences that they
the work of those hardy Christian pioneers who have come to look upon the law as only a re-
framed that historic!* compact, the simplest code straint upon their liberties?
"I do not wish to be understood as making
that was ever designed to govern a people, yet"
he said, "do we complaisantly point with pride a wholesale condemnation. The people in the
to our modern jurisprudence as being a monu- main are honest. There is such a thing as a pub-
ment to our superior intelligence and to all of lic conscience, and when the people are aroused
the virtues that contribute to the making of a they are as true as steel to vindicate the right,
so that, in spite of all the rascals inside and
good and great republic.
"Is this a fair comparison? Is this being per- outside the penitentiary, we do not despair of a
great and happy future for this glorious repub-
fectly true to them and to ourselves?
"I think not. Simple as was their code, it lic."
sufficed, and they obeyed it in spirit and in let-
ter. How is it to-day with us? Alas, we are HOWARD PIANO FOR OPERA HOUSE.
in too many respects a nation of law breakers.
What are all the laws in the world for if they be Agent for the R. S. Howard Co. in Cuba Has
Written a Most Pleasing Communication Re-
not obeyed? We are forever busy making laws.
garding the Esteem in Which the Pianos
We are forever busy stopping the crevices to
Made by This Company Are Held in That
keep out crime. Too many of our laws are like
Country—Doing Big Southern Trade.
old hats stuffed in the window to keep out the
weather. What with Federal and State legisla-
The R. S. Howard Co., of 639-41 West 49th
tion we have multiplied our laws until no man
street, were pleased to receive a most flattering
can count them. I applied to the department of
testimonial from their agent John L. Stowers,
justice to learn how many laws were on the
at Havana, Cuba, the past week, relative to one
statute books, and was told that it was impossible
of their new scale style R pianos, which was
to estimate them. We have multiplied our law-
recently sold to the San Carlos Opera House. The
yers until they are falling over one another in
import of the testimonial was that the instru-
their strike for business.
ment filled every requirement as to style, action,
"Congress is a great law factory, to turn out
tone and other qualities that go to make up a
new statutes and to repair broken and worn-out
high grade instrument and that the main object
laws. State legislatures are vying with Congress
in making a change was to get a piano that would
and each other in the number of laws that they
stand the trying climate and be as near rust and
shall place on their statute books.
damp proof as possible. The R. S. Howard Co.
"Laws! Laws! Laws! Every way we turn
make a specialty of this class of instrument for
we- are met by laws. And while all this law
export trade and have built up an enviable repu-
making is going on the greatest legal talent in
tation all through the Islands of Cuba. In fact,
the country is employed at the highest prices to
this concern are the largest exporters of pianos
find ways to evade the law. Their efforts are to
to that section in Greater New York, if not in
get round, or over, or under, or through the law,
the East. This concern also make large ship-
rather than to secure obedience to the law. The
ments to Key West, Milan, Italy and London,
late Sidney Bartlett said to a client: 'You want
England.
me to show you how to do an illegal thing in a
legal way.'
JACOBI LEAVES FOR HIS OLD HOME.
'^There is more ability employed to lireak the
Henry Jacobi, an expert piano maker, and who
laws than to make them. I say this without pre-
suming to disparage the 317 lawyers in the Sen- for twenty-eight years was factory superintend-
ate and House of Representatives, numbering 476 ent for J. & C. Fischer, sailed with his family
memibers, for I believe the lawyers to be the last week for his old home in Thun, Switzerland,
ablest and most useful members in Congress, but where he will make his permanent residence.
is it not a fact that we have too much legisla- Several members of his family are engaged in
tion, too many laws, and that there is too little piano manufacturing in that country, one of his
disposition to observe them? Certain it is we brothers having a large factory in Biel. Mr.
have too little power to enforce them. Justice Jacobi will take charge of the retail warerooms,
controlled by the family in Thun. Mr. Jacobi
is tardy, or comes not at all.
TOO BUSY IN MAKING LAWS
was succeeded as~ superintendent of the J. & C.
Fischer factories by Gustav Yorkland, whose
ability as a piano maker and scale drawer is
well known to the trade.
DEALERS COMMENCING TO ORDER.
J. S. Holmes Makes Cheerful Report to Head-
quarters Regarding Trade Conditions as He
Finds Them on the Road.
J. S. Holmes, Jr., vice-president of the firm of
Henry & S. G. Lindeman, who is now covering the
Far West, is sending in some large orders and
withal is very well satisfied with his trip, every-
thing considered. He also writes his house that
dealers are commencing to move their stock and
will soon be ready to place business for they
were never so short of goods as they are at the
present time. Mr. Holmes is at present in Col-
orado and will not return to the great metropolis
for at least another month. Mr. Holmes has
closed a fine business on H. & S. G. Lindeman
player pianos and states that this class of in-
strument is gaining in popular favor daily. In
fact, many dealers, who were loath to handle
interior players are now placing them on their
floor and are having considerable success with
them. Quite a number of dealers, he adds, are
holding special sales and find by generous ad-
vertising in the local papers that they are able to
stimulate business to no small degree.
PIANOS FOR NORMAL COLLEGE.
Hallet & Davis and Kimball Pianos Selected
for This Institution at Livingston, Ala.
The Alabama Normal College, at Livingston,
Ala., have purchased an entirely new equipment
of Kimball and Hallet & Davis pianos for their
music department, the sale being made by J. B.
Chamberlain, vice-president of the Seals Piano &
Organ Co., Birmingham. The Seals Co. recently
filled another extensive order for pianos from a
prominent store.
DEMAND FOR MASON & HAMLIN ORGANS.
Whether times are good or bad there is still a
healthy demand for the Mason & Hamlin organs
and Manager Charles E. Brockington, of the
New York branch, has succeeded in corralling
numerous orders for both Liszt and chapel or-
gans, some of the purchasers being as follows:
Grove Reformed Church, Weehawken, N. J.; St.
Luke's Episcopal Church, Eldred Congregational
Church, German Lutheran House, New York, and
Andrew Johnson Lodge, I. O. O. F., while the fol-
lowing battleships and cruisers of the United
States Navy, some of them at present with
Evans' great squadron, are equipped with Mason
& Hamlin organs: New York, Columbia, Chi-
cago, Newark, Monongahela, Detroit, Machias,
Philadelphia, Oregon, Minneapolis, Portsmouth,
Charleston, Texas and Essex.
The Mason & Hamlin Co. in their latest cata-
log give*a list of the many famous people, in-
cluding well known musicians, who have bought
Mason & Hamlin organs and also a list of awards,
wen by those instruments at various expositions
Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
THE:
MUSIC TRADE
REVIEW
EDWARD LYMAN BILL - Editor and Proprietor
J. B. SPflLLANE, Managing Editor
Executive and Reportorlal Stall i
0BO. B . KCT.T.BB,
L. D. BOWERS,
W. H. DYKES,
F. H. THOMPSON.
J. HATDEN CLARENDON.
B. BBITTAIN WILSON,
L. J. CHAMBBRLIN,
A. J. NICKLIN.
••STON •FF1CE:
CHICAGO OFFICE:
E. P. VAN HARLINQEN. 195-197 Wabash Ave.
TELEPHONES : Central 414 ; Automatic 8643.
MINNEAPOLIS and ST.PAUL:
ST. LOUIS:
DBNBBT L. WAITT, 278A Tremont Bt
PHILADELPHIA t
R. W. KAurruAN.
A D O U EDSTDN.
SAN FRANCISCO:
CHAS. N. VAN BDRUN.
S. H. GRAY, 2407 Sacramento Bt
CINCINNATI. O.i NINA PUGH-SMITH.
BALTIMORE, MO.: A. ROBERT FRENCH.
LONDON. ENGLAND:
69 Baslnghall S t , E. C.
W. Lionel Sturdy, Manager.
Published Every Saturday at 1 Madison Avenue, New York
Enttrtd
at the New York Pott Office as Second Class Matter.
SUBSCRIPTION. (Including postage). United States and Mexico, $2.00 per year;
Canada, $3.50 ; all other countries, $4.00.
ADVERTISEMENTS, $2.00 per Inch, single column, per Insertion. On quarterly or
yearly contracts a special discount is allowed. Advertising Pages, $60.00; opposite
reading matter, $75.00.
REMITTANCES, In other than currency form, should be made payable to Edward
Lyman Bill.
Dlraetwy ot P l o o
The directory of piano manufacturing firms and corporation!
~
~ ~
found on another page will be of great value, as a reference
Msinlieturcri
f o r dealers and others.
Exposition Honors Won by The Review
Grand Prim
Paris Exposition, 1900 Silver Medal. Charleston Exposition 1902
Diploma.Pan-American Exposition, 1901 Gold Medal.. . S t Louis Exposition, 1904
Gold Medal. ...Lewis-Clark Exposition. 1905.
LONG DISTANCE TELEPHONES—NUMBERS 4677 and 4678 GRAMERCY
Connecting all Department*.
Cable address: "Elblll New York."
NEW YORK, FEBRUARY 1 5 , 1908
~~
EDITORIAL
WELL-KNOWN member of the piano trade, while discuss-
ing business conditions with The Review recently, said:
"We have lost nothing but confidence." True, but that "nothing"
in this case is a very important essential in the business life o'f the
country, and are the men high up in the nation's councils doing
what they can to restore that confidence ?
Now, admitting that there may be a great deal to criticize in
high financing; admitting that gold bricks have been handed out
to the people by these manipulators of great corporations, whose
proper place is behind the bars; admitting all that, but why because
a few men in the community have gone wrong should the distrust
of everyone be continued? It is all well enough to talk about the
"malefactors of great wealth," as Mr. Roosevelt terms them, or
the "criminally rich," as Mr. Bryan designates them, but does the
discrediting of our business interests help matters in the way of
restoration of confidence? Ejaculatory sentences, even though they
may be fierce and even dripping with oratorical lava, do not bring
about a revolution. They may disturb conditions, but they do not
help them.
A
A
FTER all, what is the common dogma that unites Roosevelt
and Bryan, and is echoed by the various papers throughout
the country ? It is not that here and there are diseased spots which
need to be cut out. It is not that we have the usual average out-
breaks af the sinful heart of man and that the world old struggle
among men for material possessions leads now as always to seizure
of unfair advantages.
T
H E dogma is none of these. It is that confidence has much
less basis for foothold than at times past, and distrust infinitely
more. That is the meat of the business cocoanut. Did not men sin
before corporations were invented, and how is this charge against
the general character and integrity of our business and financial
establishments supported ? By a comprehensive survey of the facts ?
Not as we view them. It is established by that weakest of all
methods of demonstration—the citing of particular instances.
Would it be fair if, because some men committed burglary, that all
REVIEW
men should be accused of being thieves? Suppose we have had
some dishonest men in the piano industry, should it follow that all
are tarred with the brush of dishonesty?
L
AST year the percentage of trusts respected and obligations
fulfilled was probably as great as any year since recorded
history began, and yet this great essential is ignored. What do the
reformers say of this fact? Is it scare headed over the country?
We hear nothing about the good that men have accomplished—of
how they have lived up to their moral and financial obligations.
No, there is nothing said about that, but because the two per cent,
of thieves have carried on a gambling game the whole country must
suffer. When we come to figure upon these utterances against the
integrity of the country coming from those whom we should expect
better things, is it strange that the commercial affairs of this country
should have suddenly collapsed ?
Getting back to the statement of the piano manufacturer, "we
have lost nothing but confidence." That is true. We have had no
plague, nor succession of bad crops, but that same confidence is- the
necessary arterial blood of modern industrial civilization, and its
healthy flow has been interrupted. We are distrustful. We have
lost confidence in each other. We are afraid to do business on the
same terms as before. It is all well enough to say that we were going
too fast a pace ; that we were spending too much money; that we
were living beyond our means, but why not say that to-day there
are more people, better housed, better dressed than ever before
in the history of the world, showing that the great world heart of
man is in the right, place; that there are more institutions of learn-
ing, more refuges for the unfortunate, more dollars expended to
alleviate human suffering than ever before. Why do we not say
that millions upon millions are given by these "malefactors of great
wealth" for the cause of education and science? That money
taken from the people is given back to them? Why is it not well
to 1 emphasize the good that men have done instead of pouring out
these rattling volleys of abuse which shake the confidence of the
people in each other? The misdeeds of the few should not dis-
credit and injure the many.
A
S long as there are inequalities of brains there will be inequal-
ities of wealth, but there are always some who abuse their
position. But why breed distrust which is sure to destroy confi-
dence, that confidence so necessary to business success ? Yes, "the
only thing we have lost is confidence," and we shall not fully regain
it until we recognize the good that men have done; recognize the
honesty of purpose; recognize the higher accomplishments of in-
dividuals just as completely, as publicly, as vociferously as we
condemn dishonest principles. "Nothing lost but confidence," but
that is a great deal, and are we doing what we should do, each one
of us, to win it back ? Are we not talking too much of the evil and
too little of the go'od that men do ? Everyone is affected by existing
conditions, whether he is laboring by the day or whether he is an
employer of labor. There is no enterprise of any nature in this
land which has not been stricken by this business slump which was
created by the destruction of confidence.
T
H E piano player proposition did not develop until special
emphasis was placed upon it. Some dealers who sold players
for years in an indifferent manner, and whose stock was carried in
a most unattractive style, complained bitterly of their lack of sales
and became disgusted with the player outlook. Hut there were plenty
of shrewd intelligent men who saw that the player proposition must
be treated separately. It must be properly wareroomed and sales-
manized in order to produce results. As a consequence special
rooms were fitted up and player experts were placed in charge and
the business gradually grew into very large proportions. It never
would have reached its present position had it not been carefully
nurtured and specialized. It must be the same with talking ma-
chines, for that cannot be said by dealers if treated in a slipshod
manner. One or two talking machines displayed in a window
together with a lot of pianos will not draw trade, particularly when
a customer finds upon entering the store that no proper environment
is given them.
Special rooms should be fitted up and men placed in charge of
the talking machine department who know something about the
wonderful powers of entertainment of the up-to-date talker. It
should not be placed in the hands of a piano salesman who has given

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