Piano Detectives

[Delwin D Fandrich]

Les Smith wrote:

> ... In addition to those two companies, one sometimes encounters another, les-
> ser-known Chickering "company". Although the history books usually gloss
> of this part of the Chickering story, the fact is that Jonas Chickering
> fathered an illegitimate son by the name of Ebeneezer Zachariah Chicker-
> ing, or "E. Z." Chickering as he is more commonly known. Old "EZ" was
> the black sheep of the family. He didn't go into the family business like
> his brothers, in fact he didn't go into manufacturing pianos at all. In-
> stead, his specialty was manufacturing DECALS. He would pick up any old.
> no-name, POS, PSO, POJ piano, remove the original decal, slap on one of
> his "EZ" Chickering decals and then try to pass the piano off as the real
> thing. For clarity's sake, I refer to original, genuine Chickerings as
> "Chickerings" and "EZ's" imposters as "Chickenwings". The rest of this
> post tells you how to distinguish one from the other. It's not difficult....
>
> Les "Sherlock" Smith
> lessmith@buffnet.net

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Next question, Professor Sherlock Smith,

We know that EZ Chickering sold out to Aeolin before the rest of the family did, but--with all that free time on his
hands--what was his influence on the company prior to 1932?

In other words, just when did Chickering drop some of its distinctive features? I.e., when did the flared action go? The
brass flanges? The screwed-in damper wires? The bottom-mount pinblocks. Etc. I've rebuilt quite a few Chickerings over the
years--no two of them were ever alike--but have not paid much attention to their vintage/features ratio. They seem to have
had an active R&D department that produced and sold every experimental idea they ever came up with.

After 1932, of course, all that stopped as Aeolian's own R&D department took over. Their mission, as near as can be
determined by outsiders, was to determine just how un-musical pianos could be made while still getting people to buy them.
Unfortunately, just as they were getting close to the final answer the company went out of business leaving this critical
work to others. There is some evidence that at least some of those researchers are still actively employed, however. As one
looks at the marketplace today it is clear that much of their work is still going on and that we are now much closer to
determining the final answer to that critical question.

-- ddf