Thomas Shriver

Biography

Thomas Shriver was the father and founder of the piano-plate foundry firm of T. Shriver & Company, one of the earliest and, for years, the leading specialist foundry for piano-plate castings in the United States. Born near Westminster, Maryland, on September 2, 1789, he was educated in a country school taught by an Irish schoolmaster. Coming from a family of iron workers, he was drawn to metalworking and later became an engineer, designing bridges and other structures that deepened his knowledge of metals. Around 1819 he invented the elliptic spring for wagons, an innovation that came into worldwide use, and he authored numerous other inventions of note. He later owned an omnibus line in Philadelphia until the adoption of street cars made it obsolete, then moved to New York, where he and his son Walter established a foundry for fine castings and piano plates. The firm became preeminent in piano-plate founding, though in the decade before 1890 newer, more enterprising competitors such as Davenport & Treacy overtook it. Thomas Shriver died before the firm's later years, leaving a large family of, per Spillane, 'clever children.'

Highlights

• Invented the elliptic spring for wagons around 1819, which came into worldwide use
• With son Walter, founded the foundry that became T. Shriver & Company, for years the leading piano-plate foundry in the United States
• Trained as an engineer designing bridges before turning to iron founding

Source

Daniel Spillane, History of the American Pianoforte (1890), p. 332.

Public domain.