Wm. Knabe & Co.

Wm Knabe & Co. was a piano Contractors in Baltimore, Maryland, which was active from the mid-19th century to the beginning of the 20th, and was later continued as a subsidiary and brand of Aeolian - American in East Rochester, New York until 1982. Nowadays the name Wm Knabe is a trademark of Samick Musical Instruments.

History

Wilhelm boy was born on June 3, 1803 in Creuzburg, Saxony- Weimar. The coalition war of 1813 prevented him from studying pharmacy in order to exercise the same profession as a pharmacist like his father can. Instead boy made ​​an apprenticeship as a cabinetmaker. After his apprenticeship he worked for two years as a journeyman, then for three years at a piano maker in Gotha, and later as a piano manufacturers journeyman at various piano manufacturers in Germany.

1831 accompanied boy 's family of his fiancée when she emigrated from Saxe-Meiningen in the United States, but the head of the family died during the voyage, and his bride remained in Baltimore, instead of the originally planned to go to Herrmann, Missouri, where a brother had some years previously established. Boy worked for the famous piano maker Henry Hartge and dropped his original plans to become a farmer. Four years later, he started from home of repairing pianos and used pianos for sale. The first address of the company Wm boy was Maryland Route 139 at the corner of Lexington Street.

Knabe & Gaehle

In 1839 a boy into a partnership with Henry Gaehle for the purpose of manufacture of pianos one. 1841, the company moved to larger workshops at 13 South Liberty Street. In 1843 they opened a retail store at the corner of Eutaw Street and Cowpen Alley. Four years later moved the business to Eutaw Street 9 opposite the Eutaw House. It sold pianos at prices 180-400 U.S. dollars. 1852 they had expanded to the houses 4, 6, 8, 9 and 11 of the Eutaw Street. Knabe & Gaehle won in 1848, 1849 and 1850 first prizes of the Maryland Institute for the Promotion of Mechanic Arts for their square pianos and 1849 for wings.

In 1852 the company reorganized as a boy, Gaehle & Co., by Edward Betts took up as a partner. 1853 advertised boy, her company was the largest piano store in the southern U.S., and occupy more than 100 employees. Knabe pianos built from six to seven octaves with a " double action as it builds Chickering ", at prices from 200 to 500 U.S. dollars.

In November 1854 their factory burned down at the Cowpen Alley at the back of the Eutaw House and caused a loss of 190,000 U.S. dollars. Only five weeks later burned the factory at Baltimore Street near the Paca Street down, with virtually no coverage by insurance.

In the spring of 1855 we began to dissolve the partnership. Henry Gaehle died. Knabe advertised that he had bought up the entire stock and will remain under the company Wm Knabe & Co. at the old location of the North Eutaw Street 1-7 in the business, compared to the Eutaw House. Was William Gaehle, the senior partner, advertised that he will build under the name Wm Gaehle & Co. at the corner of Pratt and Green Street, further pianos, with salesrooms at the corner of Eutaw and Baltimore / Fayette Street.

Boy bought a former paper mill on the corner of West Street and China Street for operating a new factory, and in 1859 he had showrooms at 207 Baltimore Street, Fayette Street. He won gold medals for square pianos of the Maryland Institute College of Art in 1855, 1856, 1857 and 1858, silver medals of the Metropolitan Institute in Washington, DC in 1857, a medal from the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia in 1856, and first prizes of the " Mechanics Institute, Richmond, Virginia in 1855 and 1856.

1860 began a new five-storey factory boy at the corner of Eutaw and West Street to build, but had only one wing, completed when the Civil War broke out. This forced him to seek new business in the West as a substitute for the loss of his substantial business in the southern U.S.. William boy died on 21 May 1864. Followed him his sons William and Ernest J. Knabe and his son Charles Keidel after.

1866 Wm Knabe & Co. led the " agraffe treble " one, with clasps, which were screwed into a thick piece of brass instead of a screw directly in the iron frame.

1866 employed a boy to 230 employees and produced about a thousand pianos a year, both upright pianos and square pianos and grand pianos, the output of the factory was about 30 pianos a week. The factory was equipped with a 30 horsepower steam engine, steam powered elevators and drying rooms were available. In a second building of 40 m in length housing wing, soundboards and keyboards were manufactured and veneer housing and bronzed iron frame. Other additions and a dome completed the factory in 1869, which now measured 64 m at the Eutaw Street and 50 meters on West Street. Sales of Wm Knabe ranked third among the United States, behind Steinway & Sons in New York and Chickering & Sons in Boston. 1870 was the discharge about 40 pianos a week, sold at prices between 600 and 2000 U.S. dollars.

1873 Wm Knabe & Co. sales room at the 112 Fifth Avenue in New York. We were presented wing, square pianos and upright pianos. In Philadelphia, a harpsichord by Tschudi & Broadwood was exhibited at the Centennial Exposition 1876er. According to the modified award systems boy claimed together with some of her co-exhibitor highest honor, since there were no first and second places, etc., but the written report and the comments of the judges were critical. 1882 delivered a boy Palisanderflügel to the White House for President Chester A. Arthur.

William Knabe, Jr. died in 1889 at the age of only 47 years. The company was recognized with a capital of one million U.S. dollars. At their head stood Ernest J. Knabe as president.

Ernest J. Knabe died in 1894 at the age of 57 years. He was followed by his sons was Ernest J. Knabe, Jr., President and William Knabe Vice President and Chief Financial Officer.

Wm Knabe & Co. in 1903 agencies in Canada and England and belieh the factory for the purpose of expanding the business. 1906 occupied the factory seven buildings, also you had the original building massively upgraded, with a new total of 30,000 square feet of meticulously planned production area and 765 employees. Although the factory contained modern facilities such as individually motor-driven machines and a dust extraction system, advertised boy that their standard further requires the careful manual work, so a big upright piano took six months to its completion and a grand piano two years.

American Piano Co.

1908 Wm Knabe & Co. created together with Chickering and Sons and the Foster - Armstrong Co. in East Rochester, New York, the American Piano Co. under the law of New Jersey. Presidents were Ernest J. Knabe, Jr., CHW Foster of Chickering & Sons and George G. Foster, of Foster - Armstrong, each controlled their incorporated companies, and Haines Brothers, Marshall & Wendell, Brewster, and JB Cook & Co., with a total output of 18,000 pianos a year.

Knabe Brothers

Ernest and William Knabe gave up their positions in 1909, and as a result of some confusion and business problems in New York in 1911, they founded the company "Boy Brothers" with offices in Cincinnati, Ohio. They made upright pianos and grand pianos in the former factory of Smith and Nixon in nearby Norwood, " free from the commercial point of view to define the pianos sought as a collection of square inches of wood and wire ." American Piano Co. was now taking legal action against the use of the name " boy ", but the ultimate decision held the boy brothers only by the use of their name on the keyboard lid off and asked them to clarify that it was a start-up. The factory was destroyed by fire in January 1912, but they quickly took back the production in a Behelfsfabrik on before they started to build a new factory at the old location. The company went public at the end of 1916 due to an unpaid bank loan in a preliminary stage of bankruptcy ( " receivership " ), and at the end of the brothers declared bankruptcy boy. Your liabilities amounted to 660,000, their fortunes parts only 476.00 U.S. dollars.

Ernest J. Knabe died in 1927, William Knabe 1939.

Ampico

1927 the New York sales rooms of Wm Knabe & Co. from 39th Street to 657 Fifth Avenue at 52nd Street in Manhattan to, and 1928 to train for Ampico Tower on Fifth Avenue and 47th Street as part of the move of the American Piano Co., to consolidate the sales of all Ampico brands, all this make up in a ultimately unsuccessful attempt, the sharp decline in profits. American Piano went in 1929 to the " receivership "; the debt of a boy were estimated to be $ 286,000, assets of $ 415,000.

In 1930 the assets of the undertaking "American " of the American Piano Corporation were bought, which had been re-established under the laws of Delaware. The Board included both former Ampico board members as well as board members of the Aeolian Corporation. The boy factory was closed, as well as Chickering in Boston. Production was finally to East Rochester, New York, transferred, where the marks were formed as separate divisions. The old factories, including Mason & Hamlin in Boston and Amphion in Syracuse, New York, have been thrown on the market for Sale Will.

Aeolian - American

1932 merged the American Piano Corp.. with the Aeolian Company, Aeolian - Weber Klavierbautochter to form the Aeolian American Corporation, which consolidated the control of more than 20 piano brands, as well as the production of keyboards and cast plates. In 1936, the company is the fourth largest in the U.S., behind Kimball, Baldwin and Winter & Co.

Berthold Neuer, the vice president and general manager from 1927, died 1938, and his successor, Richard K. Paynter died 1940.

The factories in 1942 were commissioned to produce military aircraft parts, which got the staff and facilities in work. But no later than 1949 returned the piano production back to full capacity. The Aeolian Company and the American Piano Corporation recapitalised and merged with the Aeolian - American Corporation in 1951. The company in 1957 was bought by the owners of Winter & Co. of the Bronx, New York.

1981 employed the combined divisions at the factory in East Rochester to 300 employees; the factory closed in the following year.

Sohmer & Co.

See also the main article to Sohmer. 1985 Sohmer & Co. bought the trademark rights to Knabe and Mason & Hamlin and their devices and the equipment from the Citicorp Industrial Credit Co., the main creditors of Aeolian. Sohmer & Co. planned the production of both divisions with the existing models resume, but was sold and reorganized itself along with Sohmer and Knabe as subsidiaries of Mason & Hamlin.

Today

Pianos by Wm Knabe & Co. are of Samick Musical Instruments, Ltd.. built, the naming rights of PianoDisc, the owners of Mason & Hamlin acquired in 2001.

To 2007 Knabe pianos were offered in three upright piano greats - a 119 cm (47 inches ) in three veneer finishes, a 121 cm (48 inches ) and 131 cm (52 inches ) model - and four sizes of wings - in each case three body and the lengths of 158 cm ( 5 feet 3 inches), the WKG53, 173 cm ( 5 feet 8 inches), the model WKG58, 193 cm ( 6 feet 4 inches), the model WKG64, and length of 215 cm ( 7 ft ) models WKG70.

2006 announced the Samick Music Corporation, the distributor for Samick in the United States and Canada that you set up a logistics and distribution center of 210,000 m² in Gallatin (Tennessee), where one manufactures the lines boy and JP Pramberger since 2007.

2010 reported the Samick Music Corporation that various boy - models get their bodies from Korean production and that the production of keyboards and finishing in Gallatin, Tennessee is done.

Swell

  • " William Knabe " Baltimore: Past and present, with Biographical Sketches of its Representative Men Richardson & Bennett, Baltimore, 1871, p. . 349-352
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