Upright Harp Piano: Museum Object and Cultural History

The object in the museum catalogue

This piano’s maker is unknown, but was made in the United States around 1850-1875. It is a harp piano, similar to the two Kuhn & Ridgeway uprights in the collection. This piano has a compass of CC-c5, tape-check action, felt (?) hammers, wound single-strings CC-FF#, wound double-strings GG-G, plain double-strings G#-c5, 2 pedals: keyboard shift (?) and dampers, metal frame on each side of the pin block, metal tension bar from pin block to lower frame with some wood in the lower frame, strings outside the case from the keyboard to the pin block, dark veneer lower case, an upper case which is heavily carved, gilded post on left with diagonal garland, and decorative metal on the bentside.

Materials, dates and provenance

• Date made: 1850 - 1875
• maker: unknown
• Object Name: piano
• Measurements: overall: 91 1/4 in x 58 1/4 in x 24 in; 231.775 cm x 147.955 cm x 60.96 cm
• Place Made: United States
• ID Number: MI.315469
• accession number: 65526
• catalog number: 315469
• Credit Line: Gift of Mrs. J. Ryan Devereux
• 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.