Jonas Chickering

Biography

Jonas Chickering was born in New Ipswich, N.H., on April 5, 1798, and came to Boston about 1817 after serving an apprenticeship as a cabinetmaker and joiner. Well educated and mechanically talented, he studied piano making under John Osborn until 1823, when he entered partnership with James Stewart as Stewart & Chickering. After the firm dissolved in 1826, Chickering continued alone, hampered by lack of capital until John MacKay joined him as a business partner, freeing Chickering to devote himself to invention and construction; many of his best inventions date from this period. He exhibited at the 1851 London World's Fair, engaged prominent virtuosos to play his grand pianos, and served as vice-president and later seven-term president of the Handel and Haydn Society. He worked out every improvement fully on the drawing board before releasing it to his mechanics. His Tremont Street factory burned down on December 1, 1852, at a loss of $250,000, but he rebuilt at once on a larger scale. Jonas Chickering died on December 8, 1853, in his fifty-sixth year, worn down by the strain of rebuilding; he had educated all three of his sons as practical piano makers and admitted them to partnership in 1852 as Chickering & Sons. Jonas Chickering is described as an excellent piano maker and inventor who had the good sense to associate himself in 1830 with John MacKay, an enterprising commercial genius who spread the fame of the Chickering piano across the United States. At the 1851 World's Fair in London, Chickering exhibited the first American pianos ever shown in Europe and won the highest honors, alongside creditable exhibits from Meyer of Philadelphia, Nunns & Clark of New York, and Gilbert & Company of Boston. After MacKay's death, Chickering, though far ahead of other American manufacturers, did not continue the aggressive business policy MacKay had begun, and, lacking an inspiring leader, the American piano industry progressed only slowly from 1840 until 1855, when Steinway & Sons emerged. Chickering & Sons later followed Steinway's example by building concert halls (Chickering Hall) in New York and Boston. Jonas Chickering is described by Dolge as "that great mechanical genius" who, in 1843, patented a full iron frame for flat-scale grand pianos, inaugurating the era of the full iron frame in American piano building. He demonstrated the practicability of the new system, and as a direct result the group of makers Dolge calls the "Boston school" quickly adopted full iron frames for their grand, square, and upright pianos as well. Chickering's success followed earlier partial steps by figures such as Robert Stodart and Alpheus Babcock, and preceded the further refinement of the overstrung system combined with the solid iron frame that Steinway & Sons demonstrated in 1855. Dolge frames Chickering's patent as the decisive American breakthrough that European makers, more cautious about the iron frame's effect on tone, were slower to accept. Jonas Chickering is credited with improving Alpheus Babcock's full iron frame so materially in 1837 that a patent was granted to him for the improved design in 1840. Dolge frames this as a key step, alongside Babcock's original 1825 invention, in the chain of iron-frame development that allowed piano makers to answer the demand for larger tone through heavier stringing, which the earlier wooden frame could not withstand. An illustrated diagram of Chickering's full iron frame for a square piano, showing the wrest plank area and string supports, accompanies the text. No other biographical detail is given. Jonas Chickering patented his full iron frame for flat-scale grand pianos in 1843, a design Dolge describes as a great improvement on James Broadwood's earlier combination of an iron hitch plate with resisting bars, and one that established the fame of the Chickering concert grand. Sixteen years later Steinway & Sons would patent a full iron frame for grand pianos with an overstrung scale and fan-shaped string disposition. An illustration of the "Chickering Grand Iron Frame, 1843" accompanies the discussion. Jonas Chickering is named as the founder of the great piano business established in Boston, which he and his sons, Frank and George Chickering, built up into Chickering & Sons. No further biographical detail is given in this passage. From Spillane (1890): Jonas Chickering was a Boston piano manufacturer whose firm rose to a leading position in the American piano trade. After his early partner Mackay was lost at sea, Chickering took over more of the shop's shipping and commercial affairs until his sons could join him, at which point the firm became Chickering & Sons. He patented a square metal plate with an improved damper arrangement on October 8, 1840, and, more significantly, patented a solid one-piece cast-iron plate for grand pianos in 1843, described by Spillane as 'the great stepping-stone to the overstrung grands now in use.' His patent specification also detailed a method of supporting piano strings through a solid cast ledge (agraffes), improving on a principle introduced by Erard of Paris around 1808. Around 1843 his firm, alongside Nunns & Clark, Boardman & Gray, and the Louds of Philadelphia, led the trade in commercial enterprise. Chickering was active in Boston's musical life, serving as Vice-President and later President of the Handel and Haydn Society, which he joined in 1834. He died on December 8, 1853, at a friend's house, from the sudden rupture of a blood vessel, a year after fire destroyed a quarter-million dollars of his firm's stock. Jonas Chickering was a Boston piano maker whom Spillane identifies as the pivotal figure in the technical nationalization of the American pianoforte. He adopted Robert Wornum's "tape-check" upright action, with certain modifications, after its introduction in England, though public interest in uprights soon waned in favor of squares. Spillane's larger claim for Chickering rests on his work with cast-metal piano plates: having studied the relationship of resistance and tension while developing metal plates for squares and grands, Chickering recognized that the American pianoforte's future lay in larger cases with greater resonating capacity and tone-producing power. Spillane credits him, together with Alpheus Babcock, with the first successful and permanent introduction of metal plates into American squares and grands, stating no impartial historian could deny Chickering credit for these innovations. Early in his career, James Stewart served as his first business partner before emigrating to London. Jonas Chickering was born in Ipswich, New Hampshire, and trained as a cabinet maker, a skill Spillane suggests should be considered an advantage rather than an incidental origin story. Moving to Boston, he became employed in John Osborn's shop, where he formally learned pianoforte making alongside fellow cabinet maker Timothy Gilbert. Spillane dismisses as a 'manifest absurdity' the popular tale that Chickering conceived of piano-making only after being called to repair one at home. Around 1830, Chickering took on Captain John Mackay as a business partner, forming Chickering & Mackay; Mackay, who had backed Alpheus Babcock, brought capital and commercial ambition, aggressively establishing sales agencies nationwide, while Chickering devoted himself to the firm's technical department. Chickering is also credited with patents for a full solid-cast iron plate for square pianos (with a damper improvement) and for grand pianos. Jonas Chickering founded what became Chickering & Sons in a modest shop on Common Street in Boston in 1823. Described as personally inventing and introducing every new improvement that appeared in his pianos throughout his life, he introduced the 'circular scale' in squares in 1845, later developed further by his son C. Frank, and is credited with having accomplished overstringing in an upright piano as early as 1850. He was affectionately once styled 'upright, square, and grand, like his own pianos.' Upon his death in 1853, the task of preserving and perpetuating the honor and fame of the house passed to his three sons, Thomas E., C. Frank, and George H. Chickering, who had all been admitted as partners the previous year. Jonas Chickering was among the American piano-makers who sent instruments to the 1851 London World's Fair, the first time American manufacturers had been represented at a European exhibition. He traveled to England personally, accompanied by his son C. Frank Chickering, then a young man, to superintend the exhibit; the instruments shown carried off the highest honors, prompting the London Times to single out the American pianos for praise even while it found little else to commend in the American exhibits generally. Elsewhere Spillane names Chickering, alongside James A. Miller, and Henry Hazelton, as an exemplar of the kind of citizen produced by democratic institutions. Jonas Chickering trained as an apprentice in the Boston shop of John Osborn, where his intelligence and superior skill as a piano-maker attracted the attention of James Stewart. Stewart induced Chickering to join him as a partner in an independent business, and in 1823 the firm of Stewart & Chickering opened on Tremont Street, moving the following year to 20 Common Street. The partnership continued at that location until 1826, when Stewart departed for London, where he later became associated with the Collard & Collard pianoforte firm. A portrait of Chickering, with an accompanying signature reading 'J. Chickering,' appears among the illustrations in this section of the text. Jonas Chickering is credited by Spillane, along with Alpheus Babcock, with originating the Boston practice of casting piano plates in solid iron, an innovation copied and modified by other Boston makers while resisted for years by New York and Philadelphia manufacturers. His shop trained piano maker Edwin Brown, later of Brown & Hallet, as an apprentice-graduate, and the firm of Chickering & Sons subsequently made use of elements of Brown's complicated 1843 grand-action patent. Spillane also notes that a genuine Chickering instrument represented a costly standard many New England musical families could not afford, underscoring the firm's stature in the trade. Jonas Chickering's death in 1853 marks the point up to which earlier chapters of the book had already traced the historical development of the firm of Chickering & Sons. Introducing the firm's modern history, the text notes that Chickering & Sons was, as of 1890, the oldest pianoforte house on the American continent, with a record extending in an unbroken line back to 1823 — a span of sixty-seven years — and a prestige that had never retrograded with the advance of time. The narrative goes on to add a few connecting observations concerning the firm's next principal figure, C. Jonas Chickering is described by Spillane as having been technically trained by, and an early student of, John Osborn, the prominent New York maker. Earlier in his career he was in partnership with the Scottish maker James Stewart under the firm name Stewart & Chickering, a piano from which was sold to B. Leeds of Boston in August 1823. According to Chickering's son George H. Chickering, Jonas Chickering later encountered Stewart again while traveling, meeting him in London in 1851 after Stewart had become foreman at Collard & Collard's. Jonas Chickering headed a Boston piano manufacturing house that was among the firms—alongside Gilbert & Company of Boston, Stodart & Dunham of Worcester, Pirsson of New York, and Conrad Meyer of Philadelphia—whose advertising patronage supported Henry C. Watson's Musical Chronicle, founded in 1843. The journal was noted as the first to directly bridge piano manufacturers and the musical and artistic world, carrying letters describing the state of the Boston piano trade and personal facts about its principal shops. Jonas Chickering is credited in this passage with having originally invented, in 1851, the circular scale that W. Bourne & Company later claimed to have brought out in a purportedly original form; because Chickering's version was not patented, the text notes it falls outside the scope of what the historian need consider regarding priority. Jonas Chickering is noted by Spillane as having been prominently identified with the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association, an institution that gave premiums at regular annual exhibitions to piano-makers before 1845, alongside the Franklin Institute and New York's Mechanics' and American Institute exhibitions. Jonas Chickering, of Boston, was the original business partner of James Stewart, the pair trading as Stewart & Chickering. Instruments bearing the Stewart & Chickering inscription were among those Stewart carried to London in 1826 when he left to join the Collard firm. Jonas Chickering, the noted piano manufacturer, began his career under John Osborn, his first employer, in the building later occupied by Decker & Son at the corner of Fourteenth Street and Third Avenue in New York.

Highlights

• Improved Alpheus Babcock's full iron frame so materially in 1837 that he was granted a patent for it in 1840.
• Patented his full iron frame for flat-scale grand pianos in 1843
• His frame was a great improvement on Broadwood's combination of iron hitch plate and resisting bars, establishing the fame of the Chickering concert grand
• Called a "great mechanical genius" by Dolge
• Patented a full iron frame for flat-scale grand pianos in 1843
• His example was followed by the so-called Boston school of makers
• Described as 'that excellent piano maker and inventor'
• Associated himself with John MacKay in 1830, whose commercial drive spread the Chickering piano's fame across the United States
• Exhibited the first American pianos shown in Europe at the 1851 London World's Fair and carried off the highest honors
• After MacKay's death did not continue his partner's aggressive business policy, and the industry progressed slowly until Steinway & Sons appeared in 1855
• Trained under John Osborn, formed Stewart & Chickering in 1823, then continued alone and later with John MacKay as partner
• Rebuilt his Tremont Street factory after it burned down in 1852 with a loss of $250,000
• Served as vice-president and later seven-term president of the Handel and Haydn Society
• Founded the piano business in Boston that was built up by him and his sons and became Chickering & Sons
• Boston piano maker who partnered with James Stewart as Stewart & Chickering before Stewart departed for London in 1826
• Adopted Wornum's tape-check action for his uprights, with modifications, after its publication in England.
• Credited by Spillane as the first American maker to depart from traditional case-building methods by developing resistance-and-tension metal plates for squares and grands.
• Named alongside Alpheus Babcock as responsible for the first successful and permanent introduction of metal plates into American squares and grands.
• Apprenticed in John Osborn's shop, where his skill attracted the attention of James Stewart.
• Became partner of James Stewart in the firm Stewart & Chickering, established on Tremont Street in 1823.
• A portrait of Chickering, with his signature, appears in the text.
• Born in Ipswich, N.H.; trained as a cabinet maker before learning pianoforte making in John Osborn's Boston shop
• Partnered with Captain John Mackay around 1830 to found Chickering & Mackay
• Patented a full solid-cast iron plate for square and grand pianos with a damper improvement
• Patented a solid one-piece cast-iron plate for grand pianos in 1843, called by Spillane 'the great stepping-stone to the overstrung grands now in use.'
• Elected Vice-President of the Handel and Haydn Society in 1834 and later served as its President.
• Died December 8, 1853, of a sudden ruptured blood vessel, a year after fire destroyed a quarter-million dollars of his firm's stock.
• Described as having been technically trained by, and an early student of, John Osborn
• Partnered early in his career with the Scottish maker James Stewart under the firm name Stewart & Chickering
• Met James Stewart again in London in 1851
• Credited, with Alpheus Babcock, with originating the Boston practice of casting piano plates in solid iron.
• His shop trained Edwin Brown, later of Brown & Hallet, as an apprentice.
• Chickering & Sons later used elements of Edwin Brown's 1843 grand-action patent.
• A Chickering instrument represented the costly standard many New England families could not afford.
• Credited as the original inventor, in 1851, of a circular scale later brought out (unpatented) by W. Bourne & Company
• Prominently identified with the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association, which held annual exhibitions awarding premiums to piano-makers before 1845
• Personally traveled to England for the 1851 London World's Fair to superintend his exhibit
• His instruments won the highest honors at the fair
• Named by Spillane among exemplary American citizen-manufacturers, alongside James A. Gray, Henry F. Miller, and Henry Hazelton
• Began his career under John Osborn, his first employer
• His death in 1853 marks the point through which the earlier chapters of the book had traced the firm's history.
• The firm he was associated with, Chickering & Sons, is described as of 1890 as the oldest pianoforte house on the American continent, with an unbroken record dating back to 1823.
• Founded the business on Common Street in Boston in 1823
• Throughout his life personally invented and introduced all new improvements appearing in his pianos, including the 'circular scale' in squares in 1845 and overstringing in an upright, claimed as early as 1850
• Once styled 'upright, square, and grand, like his own pianos'; his death in 1853 passed leadership of the firm to his sons Thomas E., C. Frank, and George H. Chickering
• Boston piano manufacturer whose firm advertised in the Musical Chronicle, one of the first journals to bridge piano makers and the musical world

Sources

Alfred Dolge, Pianos and Their Makers, Vol. I (1911), pp. 175, 270, 272; Vol. II (1913), p. 69.

Daniel Spillane, History of the American Pianoforte (1890), pp. 30, 32, 38, 46, 57, 58, 87, 88, 89, 90, 92, 93, 94, 95, 156, 157, 158, 165, 166, 171, 200, 239, 260, 261, 263, 264, 268, 348.

Public domain.