Meyer

Biography

Meyer, of Philadelphia, was one of several American piano makers, alongside Nunns & Clark of New York and Gilbert & Company of Boston, who exhibited at the 1851 World's Fair in London, all making creditable exhibits alongside Jonas Chickering's prize-winning display. No further biographical detail is given. Meyer founded the firm Meyer & Company, piano makers of Munich, in 1826, named by the text among Germany's old established piano houses. From Spillane (1890): Conrad Meyer, born in Marburg, Hesse-Cassel, emigrated to Baltimore in 1819, where he entered the workshop of fellow German Joseph Hiskey and quickly learned the piano-making trade before settling in Philadelphia. He first appears in the Philadelphia directory in 1829, manufacturing at several addresses through the 1830s and 1840s. He exhibited a square piano at the Franklin Institute in 1832, and in 1833 exhibited one with an early iron plate, though the judges gave the top honors that year to Nunns & Company, Alpheus Babcock, and C. F. L. Albrecht. Meyer later achieved great prominence by claiming to have invented, in 1832, the first solid cast-iron plate on modern lines, exhibiting a square piano he said was that original instrument at the 1876 Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition and again at the 1878 Paris Universal Exposition. His claim was widely accepted by contemporary and European authorities, but Spillane contends the true precursor was Alpheus Babcock's 1825 Boston patent, to which Meyer's plate is described as "practically similar... in every way." Conrad Meyer is discussed as a figure at the center of a priority dispute over the invention of the iron piano plate. The author states that Meyer never applied for or was granted a patent in 1832, or at any time, in connection with the plate he exhibited in 1876 and in Paris in 1878, and questions whether the instrument he showed at the Franklin Institute in 1833 was in fact identical to those later exhibits. The text speculates that if the instruments were the same, Babcock -- who lived in Philadelphia in 1833 -- must have assisted Meyer or allowed him to use his invention. Separately, in the discussion of Baltimore makers, Meyer is identified as another "eminent pupil" of Joseph Hiskey's shop, alongside James Lick, though his fuller career is said to belong to the Philadelphia section of the book because of his later relocation there. Conrad Meyer was a very eminent Philadelphia piano-maker, described by Spillane as a believer in exhibition competition and whose name figures frequently in reference to Babcock's plate (metal frame) in the trade's history. He made very excellent instruments over his career and won many distinguished honors. Meyer died in 1881 in Philadelphia after a residence of over fifty years in that city. His business passed into the hands of his sons, who continued to manufacture reputable pianos carrying his time-honored name. Conrad Meyer operated a Philadelphia piano manufacturing house that was among the firms—together with Gilbert & Company and Jonas Chickering of Boston, Stodart & Dunham of Worcester, and Pirsson of New York—whose advertising patronage supported Henry C. Watson's Musical Chronicle, founded in 1843, described as the first musical journal to directly bridge the pianoforte manufacturers and the musical and artistic world. Conrad Meyer is credited, in the 1876 historical sketch by Steinway & Sons quoted by Spillane, with an invention that helped lead to the introduction of the full cast-iron frame in American pianofortes, aided by the quality of American iron and advances in the art of casting. Conrad Meyer of Philadelphia is named as one of the makers, along with Nunns & Clark and Hall & Sons of New York and T. Gilbert & Company of Boston, whose instruments the Hallet, Davis & Company piano vied with as a standard instrument as early as 1851.

Highlights

• Exhibited at the 1851 London World's Fair alongside Chickering, making a creditable exhibit
• Founded Meyer & Company, piano makers of Munich, in 1826
• Emigrated from Marburg, Hesse-Cassel to Baltimore in 1819 and trained under Joseph Hiskey
• Exhibited a square piano with an iron plate at the Franklin Institute in 1832-1833
• Claimed to be the first inventor of the solid cast-iron piano plate, a claim later credited at the 1876 Philadelphia Centennial and the 1878 Paris Universal Exposition, though Spillane argues Alpheus Babcock's 1825 patent takes priority
• Exhibited an iron-plate piano at the Franklin Institute in 1833 but, per the author, never actually applied for or received a patent for it
• Trained as an "eminent pupil" in Joseph Hiskey's Baltimore piano shop
• Later became prominent in Philadelphia piano-making, where the author says he is treated at greater length elsewhere in the book
• Credited, in Steinway & Sons' 1876 historical sketch quoted by Spillane, with an invention leading to the full iron frame.
• Philadelphia maker whose instruments were named alongside Hallet, Davis & Company, Nunns & Clark, and T. Gilbert & Company as standard instruments as early as 1851
• Eminent Philadelphia piano-maker whose name is closely associated with Babcock's metal plate frame in the trade's history
• Died in Philadelphia in 1881 after a residence there of more than fifty years; his sons continued the reputable business under his name
• Philadelphia piano manufacturer whose firm advertised in the Musical Chronicle

Sources

Alfred Dolge, Pianos and Their Makers, Vol. I (1911), p. 231.

Daniel Spillane, History of the American Pianoforte (1890), pp. 118, 119, 120, 121, 123, 127, 128, 164, 169, 170, 191, 348.

Public domain.