Frederick Engelhardt

Biography

Frederick Engelhardt, senior partner of Engelhardt & Sons, was born in Germany and came to New York with his parents at age 10. After public school he apprenticed as a cabinetmaker, then enlisted as a cavalryman in the U.S. Army, serving in battles against Native American tribes on the western plains and narrowly escaping the massacre of Custer's force by Sitting Bull. After his discharge he entered the author's employ, rising to superintendent of the soundboard department at the Dolgeville, N.Y. factories, designing the department's exhibit for the 1879 Paris Exhibition, which won the highest award. He then sought work in a piano-action factory, joining Steinway & Sons, where he headed the action department as foreman for seven years. In January 1889 he partnered with A. P. Roth to found Roth & Engelhardt, piano-action makers, which placed the 'Peerless' self-playing piano on the market in 1898, followed by the 'Harmonist' player piano and a coin-operated automatic player with endless tune sheet. When Roth retired on January 1, 1908, Engelhardt admitted his sons Alfred D. and Walter L. as partners, renaming the firm F. Engelhardt & Sons. Frederick Engelhardt was the founder and head of F. Engelhardt and Sons, a St. Johnsville, N.Y. maker of coin-operated and self-playing pianos. The text notes the unusually harmonious relationship between Engelhardt and his two sons, Alfred Dolge Engelhardt and Walter Ludwig Engelhardt, who willingly deferred to their father's judgment on business matters rather than asserting independent notions, a rarity said to call for congratulation on both sides. While his sons developed expertise in the technical construction of player pianos and orchestrions, Frederick Engelhardt supplied the business prudence and experience that, combined with his sons' technical knowledge, was credited as the key to the firm's success. He had been profiled at greater length earlier in the author's Volume I.

Highlights

• Superintendent of the soundboard department at the author's Dolgeville, N.Y. factories; designed the department's award-winning exhibit for the 1879 Paris Exhibition.
• Headed the action department as foreman at Steinway & Sons for seven years.
• Co-founded Roth & Engelhardt (1889), makers of the 'Peerless' and 'Harmonist' player pianos and a coin-operated automatic player; later renamed F. Engelhardt & Sons (1908) upon admitting his sons as partners.
• Founder and head of F. Engelhardt and Sons of St. Johnsville, N.Y.
• Guided the firm with business prudence and experience while his two sons handled the technical and construction side
• Previously profiled in Volume I of Pianos and Their Makers (pp. 378-79)

Source

Alfred Dolge, Pianos and Their Makers, Vol. I (1911), p. 379; Vol. II (1913), p. 82.

Public domain.