Presto
Issue: 1927 2109 - Page 5
PRESTO-TIMES
January 1, 1927.
CHRISTMAN
"The First Touch Tells
Christman Studio Grand
And the New Year
VICTOR COMPANY
SUED FOR MILLION
Woman Says Talking Machine Concern
Plotted to Get Her Distributing Business
and Her Charges Are Denied.
with notes on progress elsewhere leading to the con-
clusion that the German product has again become
the standard product; and that the foreigner in fact
has every reason in his own interest to support Ger-
man piano production."
Another writer in the same journal says the Ger-
man piano industry is very depressed. Home orders
are scarce and most of the old-time foreign markets
are lost. Raw materials and wages are higher and
taxes are very heavy. Technique must be drawn on
to make the difference. Some have worked on im-
proved technique for forty years, others have fol-
lowed slowly. He refrains from mentioning certain
improvements for fear of foreigners copying them.
The first step in a $1,000,000 suit against the Victor
Talking Machine Company was taken last week in the
Federal Court in Brooklyn when Louis Marshall, at-
torney for Lydia M. Green, of Great Neck, L. I.,
declared the company had ruined her husiness as a
distributor because she had braved its threats. The
corporation's "malevolent actions" were taken, the
lady's lawyer said, despite the fact that Mrs. Green's
late husband, Thomas F. Green, had followed the
earlier directions of the Victor people and enabled it
A Quaint Specimen from Cultured Boston Which
to "avoid a scandal."
Rivals That of the Wooly West.
The Cause of It.
In 1914, according to Mrs. Green's charges, her
Of late Presto-Times has called attention to the
husband started a business to distribute Victor rec- eccentric, and even grotesque advertising of Count du
ords and instruments under the name of the Silas E. Barry, of Seattle, as examples of the unusual in piano
Fearsall Company, which admittedly became ex- publicity. But cultured Boston doesn't seem far be-
tremely successful. In 1922 Mrs. George D. Orn- hind in that style of advertising pianos. As an illus-
stein was said to have entered into a controversy with tration, the following from a recent "display" of Chas.
S. Norris, 181 Tremont street, "thirty-five years in one
Green over claims for stock and money in behalf of
the estate of her deceased husband. Ornstein had location." It was headed by the line, " 'Uncle Joe'
been in the employ of the Victor Company as man- Cannon Reproved by His Daughter!"
ager of its dealings with supposedly independent dis-
Leaving his house for the Capitol, he said to his
tributors.
daughter, "Where is my damned old hat?" She
When it was learned of the Ornstein claims, ac- flashed back at him, "Father, your damned old hat is
cording to Mrs. Green's complaint, the Victor Com- on the damned old nail in the damned old closet."
pany advised Green to settle them and promised that Uncle Joe laughed, but he was more polite after that
if he did so it would continue to sell him its goods outburst.
Why don't you say, "We've had that shabby old
as long as the Pearsall company was successful. At
the same time the Victor officials, it was charged, piano long enough. I think I'll look in today and
about exchanging it for a new one." We have
urged Green, already holder of two-thirds of the see
everything in pianos. You may want an exquisite
stock of his company, to buy up the rest. This he Grand Piano like the Kranich & Bach, or a marvel-
did.
ous playerpiano like the Autopiano.
Confidential
terms. Liberal allowance. Plenty of pianos for rent.
Widow Charges Conspiracy.
Hardly had Green died in March, 1924, according
to Mrs. Green, when the Victor directors conspired
to acquire the Pearsall concern. Even before his.
funeral, she said, representatives of the Victor com-
pany ordered her to sell the business, which she had
inherited, to some one whom they w r ould name. Mrs. Jamerson's Music House, East S t Lou's, Provides
Green refused to do this, and, she said., her dealings
Interesting Display for Show Window.
with the Victor firm were stopped. Her credit was
Jamerson's
Music House, East St. Louis, 111., last
damaged, she declared, by statements the defendants
gave to the banks and efforts were made to make week provided an historic and educational feature
when it displayed the piano which stood in the White
her employes leave her.
"It appears that the Victor people thought it advis- House when George Washington was President of
able to avoid a scandal in its business and directed the United States.
This ancient piano is now the property of the
Mr. Green to settle Mr. Ornstein's claims," said At-
torney Marshall. "Under virtual compulsion he did Francis Bacon Piano Company of New York, which
this and also bought the remaining one-third of his traces its operations directly back to the time when
company's stock at their behest. Despite their agree- John Jacob Astor arrived in New York with the first
ment to continue selling to him, they schemed to take English model.
The piano shown at Jamerson's had only 68 keys
over his business."
A. L. Richards for the Victor Company argued on the keyboard, 28 being black and 40 being white.
It stands on six legs that are delicately carved and
that the alleged agreement to sell to the Pearsall com-
pany as long as it remained successful was not such shaped. Four of these are on the front and two are
on the back. The entire body of the piano is a small
a contract as to offer a cause for legal action.
box that is about two feet wide and
"The plaintiff got the right, said to be worth $500,- rectangular
five feet long. The entire height of the instru-
000, to sell goods forever," he said, "but what did the about
Victor company get out of it; the privilege of hav- ment is about three or three and a half feet.
Several times this piano has been around the world
ing Mr. Green pay some money to a stranger." The
Victor concern was free, he said, to plan to take over in the interest of the Francis Bacon Piano Company.
business it wanted, providing it paid the price.
PIANO ADVERTISING AS IT
IS SOMETIMES DONE
(Only S Feet Long)
The year closing was a good one for
dealers who represented this famous
instrument. It has precisely fitted the
desires of piano lovers, and its mod-
erate price has proved a boon to trade
and public alike. For the trade of
1927 your interests make it essential
that you look into the opportunities of
this great little Grand.
THE CHRISTMAN
Reproducing Grand
OLD WHITE HOUSE PIANO
FEATURED BY DEALER
COUNT DU BARRY'S VISITOR.
This Remarkable Instrument is
equipped with the
GERMAN PIANO AND PLAYER
IN TRADE IN FAR EAST
Construction of Mechanically Played Piano Has
Made Phenomenal Progress Within Few Years.
Has no Superiors and Few Equals in
Tone, Construction or Beauty
Write for full particulars and illus-
trated catalogues.
"The First Touch TelU"
Re*.
U. S. Pat. Off.
Christman Piano Co.
597 East 137th St.
New York
Dr. Herbert Schmidt-Lamberg writes in the Zeit-
schrift fiir Instrumentenbau of Germany, noting by
the way the increase of twenty-two per cent in the
exports of German pianos to the Far East (Japan,
China, Siam), in the first six months of this year,
compared with the corresponding period of last year,
and the very complicated nature of business with
these countries, that this success against English and
French competition establishes a degree of excel-
lence of which no other land can boast.
"Germany had to make a great effort to overcome
the prejudices against her," says the trade journal.
"The construction of mechanically-played pianos has
made unexpected progress in Germany; and has
largely overtaken America (which had the start),
with much more substantial goods. The German
piano is not the hastily synthetised American one;
and largely also the English, employing new methods
•to attain a greater output. But in Germany it is the
provision of an article for abroad that occupies the
maker, each instrument being a specially made prod-
uct. Much more self-congratulatory matter follows,
Mrs. L. Swain Mattern, 67, well-to-do widow, tired
of life with her daughter in Spokane, made a rope
of a bed sheet, climbed out of the window, and ran
away to Seattle. Christmas Eve the "runaway grand-
mother" pausing in her task of assisting little Eleanor
duBarry to decorate a Christmas tree, told why she
had come to the house of the Seattle piano dealer.
She was a friend of Count duBarry's family and
wanted a change from Spokane. And so ended the
romantic mystery.
CHANGE IN NORTH CAROLINA.
E. S. Williams has acquired by purchase the inter-
ests of S. G. Wilkerson in Wilkerson & Williams.
Greenville, N. C. The music department of the com-
pany was added by Mr. Wilkerson when he purchased
the John Flanagan Buggy Co. about ten years ago.
When Mr. Williams became a partner last year the
name was changed. The music business has grown
amazingly and the territory served includes practic-
ally every county in Eastern North Carolina.
HENRY G. JOHNSON DIVIDEND.
The Creditors' Committee of the Henry G. John-
son Piano Manufacturing Co., which failed several
years ago, has announced that another dividend may
be expected soon—probably by the first of February.
An extension is requested of the settlement notes now
in the hands of the creditors.
Enhanced content © 2008-2009 and presented by MBSI - The Musical Box Society International (www.mbsi.org) and the International Arcade Museum (www.arcade-museum.com).
All Rights Reserved. Digitized from the archives of the MBSI with support from NAMM - The International Music Products Association (www.namm.org).
Additional enhancement, optimization, and distribution by the International Arcade Museum. An extensive collection of Presto can be found online at http://www.arcade-museum.com/library/
January 1, 1927.
CHRISTMAN
"The First Touch Tells
Christman Studio Grand
And the New Year
VICTOR COMPANY
SUED FOR MILLION
Woman Says Talking Machine Concern
Plotted to Get Her Distributing Business
and Her Charges Are Denied.
with notes on progress elsewhere leading to the con-
clusion that the German product has again become
the standard product; and that the foreigner in fact
has every reason in his own interest to support Ger-
man piano production."
Another writer in the same journal says the Ger-
man piano industry is very depressed. Home orders
are scarce and most of the old-time foreign markets
are lost. Raw materials and wages are higher and
taxes are very heavy. Technique must be drawn on
to make the difference. Some have worked on im-
proved technique for forty years, others have fol-
lowed slowly. He refrains from mentioning certain
improvements for fear of foreigners copying them.
The first step in a $1,000,000 suit against the Victor
Talking Machine Company was taken last week in the
Federal Court in Brooklyn when Louis Marshall, at-
torney for Lydia M. Green, of Great Neck, L. I.,
declared the company had ruined her husiness as a
distributor because she had braved its threats. The
corporation's "malevolent actions" were taken, the
lady's lawyer said, despite the fact that Mrs. Green's
late husband, Thomas F. Green, had followed the
earlier directions of the Victor people and enabled it
A Quaint Specimen from Cultured Boston Which
to "avoid a scandal."
Rivals That of the Wooly West.
The Cause of It.
In 1914, according to Mrs. Green's charges, her
Of late Presto-Times has called attention to the
husband started a business to distribute Victor rec- eccentric, and even grotesque advertising of Count du
ords and instruments under the name of the Silas E. Barry, of Seattle, as examples of the unusual in piano
Fearsall Company, which admittedly became ex- publicity. But cultured Boston doesn't seem far be-
tremely successful. In 1922 Mrs. George D. Orn- hind in that style of advertising pianos. As an illus-
stein was said to have entered into a controversy with tration, the following from a recent "display" of Chas.
S. Norris, 181 Tremont street, "thirty-five years in one
Green over claims for stock and money in behalf of
the estate of her deceased husband. Ornstein had location." It was headed by the line, " 'Uncle Joe'
been in the employ of the Victor Company as man- Cannon Reproved by His Daughter!"
ager of its dealings with supposedly independent dis-
Leaving his house for the Capitol, he said to his
tributors.
daughter, "Where is my damned old hat?" She
When it was learned of the Ornstein claims, ac- flashed back at him, "Father, your damned old hat is
cording to Mrs. Green's complaint, the Victor Com- on the damned old nail in the damned old closet."
pany advised Green to settle them and promised that Uncle Joe laughed, but he was more polite after that
if he did so it would continue to sell him its goods outburst.
Why don't you say, "We've had that shabby old
as long as the Pearsall company was successful. At
the same time the Victor officials, it was charged, piano long enough. I think I'll look in today and
about exchanging it for a new one." We have
urged Green, already holder of two-thirds of the see
everything in pianos. You may want an exquisite
stock of his company, to buy up the rest. This he Grand Piano like the Kranich & Bach, or a marvel-
did.
ous playerpiano like the Autopiano.
Confidential
terms. Liberal allowance. Plenty of pianos for rent.
Widow Charges Conspiracy.
Hardly had Green died in March, 1924, according
to Mrs. Green, when the Victor directors conspired
to acquire the Pearsall concern. Even before his.
funeral, she said, representatives of the Victor com-
pany ordered her to sell the business, which she had
inherited, to some one whom they w r ould name. Mrs. Jamerson's Music House, East S t Lou's, Provides
Green refused to do this, and, she said., her dealings
Interesting Display for Show Window.
with the Victor firm were stopped. Her credit was
Jamerson's
Music House, East St. Louis, 111., last
damaged, she declared, by statements the defendants
gave to the banks and efforts were made to make week provided an historic and educational feature
when it displayed the piano which stood in the White
her employes leave her.
"It appears that the Victor people thought it advis- House when George Washington was President of
able to avoid a scandal in its business and directed the United States.
This ancient piano is now the property of the
Mr. Green to settle Mr. Ornstein's claims," said At-
torney Marshall. "Under virtual compulsion he did Francis Bacon Piano Company of New York, which
this and also bought the remaining one-third of his traces its operations directly back to the time when
company's stock at their behest. Despite their agree- John Jacob Astor arrived in New York with the first
ment to continue selling to him, they schemed to take English model.
The piano shown at Jamerson's had only 68 keys
over his business."
A. L. Richards for the Victor Company argued on the keyboard, 28 being black and 40 being white.
It stands on six legs that are delicately carved and
that the alleged agreement to sell to the Pearsall com-
pany as long as it remained successful was not such shaped. Four of these are on the front and two are
on the back. The entire body of the piano is a small
a contract as to offer a cause for legal action.
box that is about two feet wide and
"The plaintiff got the right, said to be worth $500,- rectangular
five feet long. The entire height of the instru-
000, to sell goods forever," he said, "but what did the about
Victor company get out of it; the privilege of hav- ment is about three or three and a half feet.
Several times this piano has been around the world
ing Mr. Green pay some money to a stranger." The
Victor concern was free, he said, to plan to take over in the interest of the Francis Bacon Piano Company.
business it wanted, providing it paid the price.
PIANO ADVERTISING AS IT
IS SOMETIMES DONE
(Only S Feet Long)
The year closing was a good one for
dealers who represented this famous
instrument. It has precisely fitted the
desires of piano lovers, and its mod-
erate price has proved a boon to trade
and public alike. For the trade of
1927 your interests make it essential
that you look into the opportunities of
this great little Grand.
THE CHRISTMAN
Reproducing Grand
OLD WHITE HOUSE PIANO
FEATURED BY DEALER
COUNT DU BARRY'S VISITOR.
This Remarkable Instrument is
equipped with the
GERMAN PIANO AND PLAYER
IN TRADE IN FAR EAST
Construction of Mechanically Played Piano Has
Made Phenomenal Progress Within Few Years.
Has no Superiors and Few Equals in
Tone, Construction or Beauty
Write for full particulars and illus-
trated catalogues.
"The First Touch TelU"
Re*.
U. S. Pat. Off.
Christman Piano Co.
597 East 137th St.
New York
Dr. Herbert Schmidt-Lamberg writes in the Zeit-
schrift fiir Instrumentenbau of Germany, noting by
the way the increase of twenty-two per cent in the
exports of German pianos to the Far East (Japan,
China, Siam), in the first six months of this year,
compared with the corresponding period of last year,
and the very complicated nature of business with
these countries, that this success against English and
French competition establishes a degree of excel-
lence of which no other land can boast.
"Germany had to make a great effort to overcome
the prejudices against her," says the trade journal.
"The construction of mechanically-played pianos has
made unexpected progress in Germany; and has
largely overtaken America (which had the start),
with much more substantial goods. The German
piano is not the hastily synthetised American one;
and largely also the English, employing new methods
•to attain a greater output. But in Germany it is the
provision of an article for abroad that occupies the
maker, each instrument being a specially made prod-
uct. Much more self-congratulatory matter follows,
Mrs. L. Swain Mattern, 67, well-to-do widow, tired
of life with her daughter in Spokane, made a rope
of a bed sheet, climbed out of the window, and ran
away to Seattle. Christmas Eve the "runaway grand-
mother" pausing in her task of assisting little Eleanor
duBarry to decorate a Christmas tree, told why she
had come to the house of the Seattle piano dealer.
She was a friend of Count duBarry's family and
wanted a change from Spokane. And so ended the
romantic mystery.
CHANGE IN NORTH CAROLINA.
E. S. Williams has acquired by purchase the inter-
ests of S. G. Wilkerson in Wilkerson & Williams.
Greenville, N. C. The music department of the com-
pany was added by Mr. Wilkerson when he purchased
the John Flanagan Buggy Co. about ten years ago.
When Mr. Williams became a partner last year the
name was changed. The music business has grown
amazingly and the territory served includes practic-
ally every county in Eastern North Carolina.
HENRY G. JOHNSON DIVIDEND.
The Creditors' Committee of the Henry G. John-
son Piano Manufacturing Co., which failed several
years ago, has announced that another dividend may
be expected soon—probably by the first of February.
An extension is requested of the settlement notes now
in the hands of the creditors.
Enhanced content © 2008-2009 and presented by MBSI - The Musical Box Society International (www.mbsi.org) and the International Arcade Museum (www.arcade-museum.com).
All Rights Reserved. Digitized from the archives of the MBSI with support from NAMM - The International Music Products Association (www.namm.org).
Additional enhancement, optimization, and distribution by the International Arcade Museum. An extensive collection of Presto can be found online at http://www.arcade-museum.com/library/
Future scanning projects are planned by the International Arcade Museum Library (IAML).