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The Perfect Melodeon: The Origins of the Estey Organ Company, 1846–1866*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 July 2012

Milton J. Nadworny
Milton J. Nadworny
Affiliation:
Associate Professor of Commerce and Economics at University of Vermont
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Abstract

The founding of the Estey Organ Company is a case study in the precarious cut-and-try method by which, in the nineteenth century, most American firms were created. Fleeting partnerships reflected the continuous search for and exhaustion of numerous small reservoirs of capital. Survival and growth were tied to increasing entrepreneurial specialization, broadening markets, and immunity to developing geographic handicaps.

Type
Research Article
Information
Business History Review , Volume 33 , Issue 1 , Spring 1959 , pp. 43 - 59
Copyright
Copyright © The President and Fellows of Harvard College 1959

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References

1 Encyclopaedia Britannica, Vol. 11 (Chicago, 1958), p. 202; Encyclopaedia Americana, Vol. 18 (New York, 1957), pp. 606–607; Pratt, Waldo Selden, ed., The New Encyclopedia of Music and Musicians (New York, 1924), p. 123.Google Scholar

2 The musical instrument manufacturing industry was a product of the nineteenth century. In 1810, Massachusetts was the only state that provided data on the industry, which was concentrated in Boston. By 1840, the total value of all instruments manufactured was less than $1,000,000, and employment in this industry was a little less than 1,000. Manufactures of the United States in 1860, Eighth Census (Washington, D. C., 1865), pp. cxlvi-cxlvii.

3 Manufactures of the United States in 1860, p. cliii; Ninth Census of the United States, 1870 (Washington, D. C., 1872), Vol. III, pp. 396, 616; Twelfth Census of the United States, 1900 (Washington, D. C., 1902), Vol. VII, Part I, p. 11.

4 Manufactures … 1860, p. cliii; Ninth Census, Vol. 3, p. 616; Twelfth Census, Vol. VII, Part I, p. 11; Manuscript Census of Vermont, Windham County, 1860, 1870, 1880, Vermont State Library, Montpelier.

5 McKinney, J. P. and Isaacs, I. J., comps., Industrial Advantages of the State of Vermont (Rochester, New York, 1890), p. 67.Google Scholar

6 Crockett, Walter H., Vermont: Its Resources and Opportunities (Rutland, Vermont, 1916), p. 73Google Scholar; Bumham, Henry, Brattleboro (Brattleboro, Vermont, 1880), p. 144Google Scholar; The National Cyclopedia of American Biography, Vol. I (New York, 1891), p. 215.

7 J. Estey and Company, The Estey Cottage Organs (New York, 1876).Google Scholar This was an illustrated catalogue which Estey distributed to its dealers.

8 Crockett, Walter H., Vermont, The Green Mountain State, Vol. V (New York, 1923), p. 598Google Scholar; Cabot, Mary R., comp., Annals of Brattleboro, Vol. II (Brattleboro, 1922), p. 632.Google Scholar See also, Dictionary of American Biography, Vol. VI (New York, 1931), p. 189.

9 Child, Hamilton, comp., Gazetteer and Business Directory of Windham County, Vermont, 1724–1884 (Syracuse, New York, 1884), p. 84Google Scholar; Cabot, Annals, Vol. II, p. 626.

10 United States Circuit Court, Vermont, Riley Burdett v. Jacob Estey & Co., Testimony before Hon. John W. Stewart, Master (Woodstock, Vermont, 1879), p. 226Google Scholar, Estey Organ Company Records. Hereafter cited as E.O.C.

11 Burdett v. Estey, p. 206.

12 “Mem. from Joe Jones,” 1892 Celebration File, E.O.C.

13 Child, Gazetteer, p. 89; Cabot, Annals, Vol. II, p. 626; The [Brattleboro] Semi-Weekly Eagle, Oct. 17 and Dec. 21, 1847.

14 The Semi-Weekly Eagle, Jan. 29, 1849.

15 Manuscript Census, Windham County, 1850; Vermont Phoenix, n. d., Celebration File, E.O.C.

16 Bassett, T. D.Seymour, “Minstrels, Musicians, and Melodeons,” New England Quarterly, Vol. 19 (March, 1946), p. 47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

17 The Semi-Weekly Eagle, Aug. 26 and Sept. 12, 1850.

18 The Brattleboro Eagle, Jan. 7, 1853. This advertisement, like many others, bore the date of its first appearance in the newspaper, which in this case was Jan., 1852.

19 Child, Gazetteer, pp. 90–91; Cabot, Annals, Vol. II, p. 627.

20 The Brattleboro Eagle, May 6, 1853.

21 See The Brattleboro Eagle, May, 1853, through July, 1854.

22 National Cyclopedia, Vol. I, p. 215.

23 The Semi-Weekly Eagle, Aug. 10, 1847.

24 See The Semi-Weekly Eagle, June 22, 1848, et seq.; Newspaper Clippings, Celebration File, E.O.C.; The Brattleboro Eagle, Aug. 5, 1853, May 19, 1854, et seq.

25 Manuscript Census, Windham County, 1850. Julius had the distinction of being listed as a female child named Julia!

26 National Cyclopedia, Vol. I, p. 215; Cabot, Annals, Vol. II, p. 632.

27 Cabot, Annals, Vol. II, p. 632. Green was a cabinetmaker by trade and had been a partner in the cabinetmaking firm of Sargeant and Green in 1850. (Manuscript Census, Windham County, 1850.) It is also noteworthy that Green and Riley Burdett jointly patented a harmonic coupler in 1857. (Report of the Commissioner of Patents for the Year 1857, House of Representatives Ex. Doc. No. 32, 35th Cong., 1st Sess. [Washington, D. C., 1858], p. 269.)

28 The Brattleboro Eagle, Jan. 20, 1854.

29 The Brattleboro Eagle, July 28, 1854.

30 The Vermont Phoenix, June 6, 1857.

31 The Vermont Phoenix, Feb. 10, 1855; Newspaper clipping, n.p. [1892], Celebration File, E.O.C.

32 Newspaper clipping, n.p., n.d., Celebration File, E.O.C.

33 See The Vermont Phoenix, Sept. 20, 1856, and Sept. 19, 1857; The [Burlington, Vermont] Daily Free Press, Sept. 17, 1859, and Sept. 17, 1860.

34 The Vermont Phoenix, Sept. 5, 1857.

35 The Vermont Phoenix, Sept. 19, 1857, Nov. 14, 1857, and Feb. 13, 1858.

36 The Vermont Phoenix, April 10, 1858.

37 The Vermont Phoenix, June 19, July 17, and Sept. 11, 1858.

38 The Vermont Phoenix, June 4, 1859.

39 Manuscript Census, Windham County, 1860; Manufactures … 1860, p. cliii.

40 Testimony, p. 343.

41 Child, Gazetteer, p. 93; Walton's Vermont Register for 1865 (Montpelier, Vermont, 1865), p. 43.

42 Walton's Register, 1864, p. 43; … 1865, p. 43; The Vermont Phoenix, Feb. 5, 1863.

43 The Vermont Phoenix, Feb. 5, 1863. The appearance of the “harmonium” indicates that Estey & Green had been manufacturing a large, and more advanced type of reed organ. It has been reported that the first “large reed organ” was manufactured in Brattleboro in 1853 – apparently, by E. B. Carpenter & Company. Cabot, Annals, Vol. II, p. 634.

44 The Burlington Free Press, Jan. 11, 1864. The fire also destroyed a tenant business in the basement, and Levi Fuller's machine shop on the first floor.

45 Sales Book, May, 1864, to May, 1867, E.O.C.; Newspaper clipping, n.p., July 1, 1864, Celebration File, E.O.C.

46 Testimony, pp. 205, 223, 226; Cabot, Annals, Vol. II, p. 629.

47 Sales Book, May, 1864, to May, 1867, E.O.C.

48 Child, Gazetteer, pp. 92–93; Cabot, Annals, Vol. II, p. 633.

49 Testimony, pp. 223, 224, 226, 227; Cabot, Annals, Vol. II, p. 629.

50 “Mem. from Joe Jones,” Celebration File, E.O.C.

51 Manufactures … 1860, pp. 729, 730; Ninth Census, Vol. 3, p. 392. It is interesting to note, however that the single largest industry, in terms of employment, in Vermont is manufacturing, and that manufacturing has accounted for a larger share of Vermont's personal income than did manufacturing in the nation as a whole during most of the years of the 1950's. Nadworny, Milton J., Report on the Labor Force and Industrial Structure of Vermont (Montpelier, Vermont, 1956).Google Scholar