Karr Violin Bow: Museum Object and Cultural History

The object in the museum catalogue

This bow was made by Albert H. Karr in Kansas City, Missouri, before 1925. It is a violin bow with a round beefwood stick with a plastic face, weighted black plastic frog with pearl eye, white plastic slide and metal ferrule bent from one piece and cut to lock the ends in place, and a plastic button. The bow is stamped:

Albert Homer Karr (1885-1971) was an American bow and violin maker (1885-1971). For most of his career, Karr was the proprietor of musical instrument shop in Kansas City, Missouri. In addition to repairing and selling other instruments, Karr made over 1,300 violins during his career and several dozen handmade violin bows. During WWII, Karr was contracted by the U. S. government to produce quality student bows.

The Violinist magazine for January 1921 featured an article about Albert H. Karr as well as an advertisement of his shop:

ALBERT H. KARR Exclusive Violin Shop 306 East Tenth Str., Kansas City, Missouri.

The Albert H. Karr Handmade Violins, finest imported wood, sent at my expense on ten days’ trial to responsible parties. Large collections of old Violins including a Stradi- varius, a Guarnerius, an Amati, a Villaume and a Lupot.

One of the finest equipped shops in the United States for repair and adjustment of fine old instruments. Mr. Karr attends to this work per- sonally. All work guaranteed. Correspondence invited.

Materials, dates and provenance

• date made: before 1925
• Object Name: bow
• Physical Description: beefwood (overall material)
• Physical Description: metal (overall material)
• Physical Description: plastic (overall material)
• Physical Description: horsehair (overall material)
• Measurements: overall: 29 1/4 in x 1 1/4 in x 1/2 in; 74.295 cm x 3.175 cm x 1.27 cm
• place made: United States: Missouri, Kansas City
• ID Number: MI.71.09
• catalog number: 71.09
• accession number: 292442
• Credit Line: Gift of Janos Scholz
• Data Source: National Museum of American History

Sources and reuse

Catalogue descriptions and facts adapted from National Museum of American History through the Smithsonian's official Open Access dataset. This record explicitly marks its metadata CC0 1.0; formatting and selection have been changed.