mystery

[JStan40@AOL.COM]

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Date: Sat, 2 Jun 2001 19:09:06 -0700
From: "Ed Carwithen" <edwithen@oregontrail.net>
Subject: mystery

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Hello experts...

I was called to look at an instrument that has me mystyfied!  It is in =
a piano cabinet.  Looks like a very ornate upright cabinet of the early =
1900's.  It has a full piano keyboard.  There are two pedals which look =
strange and angle away from each other.  The pedals pump a bellows, and =
the keys play tones like a harmonium.  There is NOTHING behind the =
top-front panal.  It is empty!  A great big boxy open space.  All of the =
mechanism is below the keyboard and above the pedal space.  It sounds =
like one of those portable camp organs.  But it looks like there ought =
to be an upright piano action in there...There isn't.

It is made by H. Lehr and Co. in Easton, PA.  According to my atlas =
H.Lehr & Co. was located in Easton, Pa., and they made Lehr & Lafayette =
pianos.  This ain't no piano!!!  The first number in the atlas for Lehr =
pianos is 18,000.  This serial is 4642.

This isn't something someone has modified.  The keys are obviously =
designed for the action which is stowed beneath.  There is a label =
describing it as a Grand Organ   =20

Has anybody seen one of these babies?  Does anyone one anywhere have any =
information at all about this instrument. =20

Enquiring minds want to know.


Ed Carwithen
John Day, OR

Ed,  this is indeed just a reed organ.  Even Sears was selling one like it, 
though cheaper and not at all ornate, under the Beckwith name.  I was given 
one in terrible condition back in the '50s, and got it all working, though 
not very expertly!  It had a full 88 keyboard, with reeds to match, no 
fudging by repeating a higher octave at the bottom.  The outer pedals were to 
the bellows, the middle pedal was a coupler, octaves up from the split 
(sorry, don't remember where that was, maybe G3 or thereabouts), octaves down 
below.  And, as I recall, it had 6 pull stops coming out of a full-width 
music desk......though there were only two full sets of reeds.  No knee 
pedals like most old pump organs had for the venetian swell built in--this 
one used suction caused by harder pumping to move the back of the wind 
chamber forward, opening the swell louvers automatically.

Seeing two high school kids carrying it easily into my house must have been a 
shock to the neighbors.............LOTS lighter than a piano!

Stan Ryberg
Barrington IL
mailto:jstan40@aol.com

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