Presto

Presto Buyers' Guide
Analyzes and Classifies
All American P i a n o s
and in Detail Tells of
Their Makers.
PRESTO
E«*bu.h*d i»$4. THE AMERICAN MUSIC TRADE WEEKLY
Presto Year Book
The Only Complete
Annual Review of the
American Music In-
dustries and Trades.
10 cent, } $t.oo . Year
CHICAGO, SATURDAY, MARCH 28, 1925
WITH THE MUSIC
MEN OF MANHATTAN
Notes of the Industry and Trade Picked Up in
the Offices and Warerooms of New York
from Fourteenth Street to the Bronx
During the Past Week or Two.
POSSESSION AND REPOSSESSION
An Instructive Reminder of the Shoninger Failure;
a French Action Maker's Visit; Louis Bach
Reminiscent; A Scrap Heat; News Items.
To possess anything, a piano for instance, is, in
legal verbiage, to have and to hold as property.
There are no complications if the person possessing
the piano has a perfect right to it. But repossessing
the piano, which may even have voluntarily left your
possession, is often a proceeding filled with complexi-
ties, intricacies and entanglements, a fact which any
piano dealer can tell you about in an excusably dolor-
ous way. Sometimes the manufacturers do not real-
ize the vexations and trials of the retailers. Even a
very shrewd attorney who bought a lot of paper
assets of the B. Shoninger Co. now knows it is one
thing to find a piano and "something else again" to
get possession of it.
In the winding up of the affairs of the B. Shonin-
ger Co. at New Haven, Conn., a lot of lease paper,
chattel mortgages, and so forth, which the company
or the assignee of the business found itself possessed
of, was sold, as the story goes, in a "lump" to an
attorney-at-law who bought the entire outfit on
"spec," as he put it. A Mr. Miles, who for years was
an employe of the old-time Waterloo Organ Co. and
the successor of that reed organ concern, the Mal-
colm Love Piano Co., at Waterloo, N. Y., was
engaged to clean up and "cash in" on the paper.
The makers of the notes, and the pianos they rep-
resented, were scattered far and wide throughout the
country where dealers had turned over the paper
as payment or as security.
Mr. Miles has now just about completed his job
and the story of his experiences and exploits in col-
lecting as related to a Presto representative in New
York last week, was interesting. A piano is a promi-
nent object in the store, but when it leaves there, fol-
lowing an installment sale, it is amazing how low
its visibility may become and how elusive its time-
payment owners may seem to the person seeking to
repossess it.
Mr. Miles has learned that it is one thing to find
a piano and another thing to get possession of it,
even if one does have legal right to seizure. How-
ever, all appearances indicate that the buyer of the
paper pocketed a snug profit, even after leaving
numerous pianos behind as doubtful of repossession.
* * *
Jacques Herrburger a Visitor.
Jacques Herrburger, son of Joseph Herrburger,
present head of the great piano action house of Herr-
burger-Schwander, Paris, France, who has been in
this country for several months past studying our
ways of business, and of work in American piano
factories, is now on a tour of the piano manufactur-
ing centers in this country and Canada in the inter-
ests of the French action.
At one time, a dozen or more years ago, the busi-
ness of Herrburger-Schwander on this side of the
water was quite a large item, running up toward
$100,000 a year in volume, and there are still a few
piano manufacturers who continue to use the
Schwander actions in more or less limited quantities.
For some months past Mr. Herrburger has been
engaged in various ways in the Knabe factory at
Baltimore. He was in New York City a few days
last week, accompanied by Mr. Rouvet, an expert in
Schwander action construction and who will become
the American representative of the House of Herr-
burger-Schwander, with headquarters in New York.
Mr. Herrburger plans to sail for home March 28 on
a French line steamer.
Remember Mac's Voice?
To radio listeners, and radio fans in particular, the
voice of Graham McNamee is familiar as the an-
nouncer of the Democratic and the Republican na-
tional conventions last year, and of various important
events that have occurred in the radio field since then.
For instance, the speeches of acceptance of both the
candidates for the presidency and the ceremonies in-
cident to the inauguration of President-elect Cool-
idge at Washington on the fourth of this month, on
which occasion Mr. McNamee preceded the regular
ceremonies by his own preliminary remarks by way
of the introduction of the various speakers. These
announcements were broadcast to all parts of the
country by relay and were heard simultaneously at
more stations than the words of any other announcer
of this country.
It is not generally known in the trade, however,
that Mr. McNamee is an excellent baritone singer and
a pianist of rare abilities. In New York City he has
many friends in the music trade, and has sung in
several church choirs there. His earliest studies in
music began at St. Paul, Minnesota, where he at-
tended of conservatory of music. Later he sang and
played in numerous cities of the west and finally set-
tled in New York, where he became the announcer
for station WEAF. He has appeared in concert at
Carnegie Hall and Aeolian Hall and is rather well
known by its habitues.
Louis Bach's Memories.
Louis Bach in a reminiscent mood, tells of the
piano manufacturing houses gone out of existence,
and points to the few who now occupy the same fac-
tories in which they started, as in the case of Kranich
& Bach, who remain today just where they were at
the beginning.
Mr. Bach came into the business of Kranich &
Bach forty years ago. He attended the school that
still adjoins the Kranich & Bach factory, immediately
at the west, and when he was graduated from the
grammar grades he went to high school and in time
was graduated from New York College. Then he
came into the Kranich & Bach factory and worked
three or four years at the bench, through all depart-
ments and then entered the office.
* * *
See Many Changes.
How many other Eastern manufacturers are now
occupying the same building in which they were
housed when Mr. Bach entered the famous old fac-
tory at Third avenue and Twenty-third street? Of
course, Steinway & Sons, at Steinway Hall, in Four-
teenth street, from which the move will be made
June 1. But these two changes have taken place.
Are there any more of the "old landmarks in the
piano industry"? Outside of New York there are a
few in the smaller cities, but progress is everywhere
and the piano industry is far from the last of the pro-
cession.
And how few of the firms have kept intact, or prac-
tically so, or in the active management or control of
the founders or their descendants. Their names
come instantly to mind—perhaps because they are so
few: Sohmer, Steinway, Weser Bros., Cable & Sons,
Christman, Decker & Son; Doll, Gabler; Hardman,
Peck & Co.; Jacob Bros.; Mehlin, Newby & Evans;
Pease, Radle, Schubert; Stutz & Bauer. Are there
any more—in New York City? There are others in
Boston—notable ones—and some even in the newer
west where piano manufacture, as we know it today,
dates back just about forty years. It's a changing in-
dustry, this of piano making, but, thank God, pro-
gressive.
Sensibly Junked.
Returning to the railway station in an Indiana town-
there appeared a vacant lot on which had been piled
in a heap half a dozen or more discarded automobiles;
one or two Oaklands, an Oldsmobile and, of course,
several Fords. They were all less than six years
old, the Oakland and Oldsmobile being six cylinder
cars. These cars were junked.
The moral is that if conditions which obtain in the
automobile business were existent in the piano busi-
ness we would have a boom in piano selling. Is
there any way to "get shut"—as they say in Indiana—
(Continued on Page 4.)
COL. WICKHAM'S DEATH
REMOVED A VETERAN
Former President of the A. B. Chase Company
Passed Away at Norwalk, Ohio, on
March Eighteenth.
The death of Col. Charles P. Wickham, who died
in Norwalk, Ohio, on March 18th, removed one of
the veterans of the western piano industry.
Colonel Wickham was for many years president of
the A. B. Chase Piano Company at Norwalk. At the
time of his death he was in his eighty-ninth year, and
at his last birthday he expressed pride in the fact that
he had lived all of his life in the same house and slept
in the same bed in which he was born. He was an
officer in the Union Army during the Civil War, and
locally he, early in life, attained an enviable reputa-
tion as an attorney.
The funeral services were held at the Presbyterian
Church, Norwalk, on March 18th. It was conducted
by the Rev. A. J. Funnell, and the Grand Army took
their customary part of the patriotic service. The
American Legion Post attended in a body, and mem-
bers of the bar, reinforced by half a score of judges
and barristers from surrounding cities, also attended.
Prior to the funeral services, the bar held a formal
session in the Court House, adopted resolutions and
heard eulogies from Judge King and other members.
During his funeral all business activities in Norwalk
ceased for fifteen minutes.
Colonel Wickham retained an active interest in the
affairs of the A. B. Chase Piano Company to the end.
PIANO CLUB OF CHICAGO
TO AID APOLLO CLUB
The Trade Organization Will Supply Money From
the Promotion of Music Fund.
The Piano Club of Chicago voted to offer financial
support to the Apollo Club during the coming year.
The funds will be supplied from the Promotion
of Music fund of the Piano Club. The Apollo is
Chicago's largest male chorus and its singing will
be one of the special features of Music Trades Con-
vention in June.
The Piano Club, of Chicago, through its Promotion
of Music Committee, awarded the following cash
prizes to music students in the contest recently held
by the Illinois Federation of Music Clubs: William
Beller, Piano, $37.50; Catherine Wade, Violin,
$37.50; Kathryn Witwer, Soprano, $37.50; Russell
Bolternstern, Baritone, $37.50.
TRAVELING REPRESENTATIVE
FOR MASON & HAMLIN CO.
Forbes-Meagher Co., of Madison, Secures Agency
for That Section of Wisconsin.
D. Stuart Pope has just been appointed by Henry
L. Mason, wholesale representative on the road for
the Mason & Hamlin Co. Mr. Pope is now making
a trip in the interests of the famous Boston pianos.
The Forbes-Meagher Music Co., Madison, Wis.,
has been given the agency in that section of the
Mason & Hamlin piano and the Mason & Hamlin
Ampico.
DENVER MUSIC WEEK.
Denver's annual Music Week will be one day
longer than the time set by the National Music Week,
and will extend from May 3 to 10. It has been de-
cided to present the opera "Erminie" under the direc-
tion of John C. Kendall, supervisor of music in Den-
vers' public schools. A Denver civic opera has been
made a part of the Community Player movement
under the leadership of Wilberforce J. Whiteman, a
name known internationally both through his own
work and that of his son, Paul Whiteman.
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