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Alpheus Babcock
Alpheus Babcock (September 11, 1785 – April 3, 1842) was a piano and musical instrument maker in Boston, Massachusetts and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania during the early 19th century. Babcock is best known for patenting a complete iron frame in a single casting used to resist the strain of the strings in square pianos, he also patented a system of stringing in squares, and improvements in piano actions. Biography Babcock was born in Dorchester, Massachusetts, and worked for musical instrument maker Benjamin Crehore (d.1828) before 1809. He established a workshop and music warehouse in Boston with brother Lewis at 44½ Newbury Street, but by 1812 they entered a partnership with organ maker Thomas Appleton (1785–1872) with workshops at 6 Milk Street. Following Lewis' death in 1814 the surviving partners formed a brief partnership with brothers Charles and Elna Hayt, the business was taken over by Mackay & Co., with Crehore's former partner, organ maker William Goodrich (d. 1834) a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Piano
The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboard, which is a row of keys (small levers) that the performer presses down or strikes with the fingers and thumbs of both hands to cause the hammers to strike the strings. It was invented in Italy by Bartolomeo Cristofori around the year 1700. Description The word "piano" is a shortened form of ''pianoforte'', the Italian term for the early 1700s versions of the instrument, which in turn derives from ''clavicembalo col piano e forte'' (key cimbalom with quiet and loud)Pollens (1995, 238) and ''fortepiano''. The Italian musical terms ''piano'' and ''forte'' indicate "soft" and "loud" respectively, in this context referring to the variations in volume (i.e., loudness) produced in response to a pianist's touch or pressure on the keys: the grea ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mungo Mackay
Mungo Mackay (April 1, 1740 – March 29, 1811) was a Scottish people, Scottish seafarer from the Orkney Islands who made a fortune in the Boston shipping trades in Massachusetts. Mungo was a highly regarded ship master, successful privateer owner and bonder, and operated a store on Long Wharf (Boston), Long Wharf in Boston. He was also active in the politics of the town of Boston and the Masonic Order in Boston. His legacy includes the Alpheus Babcock and Jonas Chickering piano manufacturing establishments. Early achievements in Boston Mungo Mackay was born in Holm Paplay parish, near Kirkwall, Orkney Islands, in 1740 to Alexander Mackay, who was married to Elizabeth Keith. Mungo made his way to Boston in about 1755, as a cabin boy, according to family tradition. By about 1760 he was deeply involved in shipping, and became a Master by 1764. He married Ruth Coney in 1763, and their first child, Mungo, Jr. was born in 1765. Ruth was a grandniece of John Coney (silversmith), John C ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
American Musical Instrument Makers
American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, people who self-identify their ancestry as "American" ** American English, the set of varieties of the English language native to the United States ** Native Americans in the United States, indigenous peoples of the United States * American, something of, from, or related to the Americas, also known as "America" ** Indigenous peoples of the Americas * American (word), for analysis and history of the meanings in various contexts Organizations * American Airlines, U.S.-based airline headquartered in Fort Worth, Texas * American Athletic Conference, an American college athletic conference * American Recordings (record label), a record label previously known as Def American * American University, in Washington, D.C. Sports teams Soccer * ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
19th-century American Inventors
The 19th (nineteenth) century began on 1 January 1801 ( MDCCCI), and ended on 31 December 1900 ( MCM). The 19th century was the ninth century of the 2nd millennium. The 19th century was characterized by vast social upheaval. Slavery was abolished in much of Europe and the Americas. The First Industrial Revolution, though it began in the late 18th century, expanding beyond its British homeland for the first time during this century, particularly remaking the economies and societies of the Low Countries, the Rhineland, Northern Italy, and the Northeastern United States. A few decades later, the Second Industrial Revolution led to ever more massive urbanization and much higher levels of productivity, profit, and prosperity, a pattern that continued into the 20th century. The Islamic gunpowder empires fell into decline and European imperialism brought much of South Asia, Southeast Asia, and almost all of Africa under colonial rule. It was also marked by the collapse of the large S ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
People From Philadelphia
A person ( : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of property, or legal responsibility. The defining features of personhood and, consequently, what makes a person count as a person, differ widely among cultures and contexts. In addition to the question of personhood, of what makes a being count as a person to begin with, there are further questions about personal identity and self: both about what makes any particular person that particular person instead of another, and about what makes a person at one time the same person as they were or will be at another time despite any intervening changes. The plural form "people" is often used to refer to an entire nation or ethnic group (as in "a people"), and this was the original meaning of the word; it subsequently acquired its use as a plural form of per ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
People From Dorchester, Massachusetts
A person ( : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of property, or legal responsibility. The defining features of personhood and, consequently, what makes a person count as a person, differ widely among cultures and contexts. In addition to the question of personhood, of what makes a being count as a person to begin with, there are further questions about personal identity and self: both about what makes any particular person that particular person instead of another, and about what makes a person at one time the same person as they were or will be at another time despite any intervening changes. The plural form "people" is often used to refer to an entire nation or ethnic group (as in "a people"), and this was the original meaning of the word; it subsequently acquired its use as a plural form of per ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1842 Deaths
__NOTOC__ Year 184 ( CLXXXIV) was a leap year starting on Wednesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Eggius and Aelianus (or, less frequently, year 937 ''Ab urbe condita''). The denomination 184 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years. Events By place China * The Yellow Turban Rebellion and Liang Province Rebellion break out in China. * The Disasters of the Partisan Prohibitions ends. * Zhang Jue leads the peasant revolt against Emperor Ling of Han of the Eastern Han Dynasty. Heading for the capital of Luoyang, his massive and undisciplined army (360,000 men), burns and destroys government offices and outposts. * June – Ling of Han places his brother-in-law, He Jin, in command of the imperial army and sends them to attack the Yellow Turban rebels. * Winter – Zh ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1785 Births
Events January–March * January 1 – The first issue of the ''Daily Universal Register'', later known as ''The Times'', is published in London. * January 7 – Frenchman Jean-Pierre Blanchard and American John Jeffries travel from Dover, England to Calais, France in a hydrogen gas balloon, becoming the first to cross the English Channel by air. * January 11 – Richard Henry Lee is elected as President of the U.S. Congress of the Confederation.''Harper's Encyclopaedia of United States History from 458 A. D. to 1909'', ed. by Benson John Lossing and, Woodrow Wilson (Harper & Brothers, 1910) p167 * January 20 – Battle of Rạch Gầm-Xoài Mút: Invading Siamese forces, attempting to exploit the political chaos in Vietnam, are ambushed and annihilated at the Mekong River, by the Tây Sơn. * January 27 – The University of Georgia in the United States is chartered by the Georgia General Assembly meeting in Savannah. The first students are ad ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Boston Directory
''The Boston Directory'' of Boston, Massachusetts, was first published in 1789. It contained "a list of the merchants, mechanics, traders, and others, of the town of Boston; in order to enable strangers to find the residence of any person." Also included were listings for public officials, doctors, bank directors, and firemen. The directory was issued annually after 1825; previously it had appeared irregularly. The number of listings in each directory reflected fluctuations in the population size of Boston. In 1789, the directory included some 1,474 listings; by 1875, there were 126,769.Advertisement for Boston Directory. Boston Almanac, 1875. Publishers included John Norman (1789); John West (1796-1803); Edward Cotton (1805-1818); Charles Stimpson (1820-1846); George Adams (1846-1857); Adams, Sampson & Co. (1858-1865); Sampson, Davenport & Co. (1865-1884); Sampson, Murdock & Co. (1885-1903); Sampson & Murdock Co. (1904-ca.1930); R.L. Polk & Co. (1944-ca.1980). Boston Director ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Mackay (Boston Industrialist)
John Mackay (1774–1841) was a well known and successful ship master and early industrialist in Boston, Massachusetts. John Mackay was born in Boston and he participated in the Mackay family business of shipping started by his father and uncle. He partnered with and financed Alpheus Babcock and Jonas Chickering in early piano manufacturing by using some of his legacy from his wealthy uncle Mungo Mackay. Early life John Mackay was the son of the Scottish immigrant Alexander Mackay (1747–1801) and his Boston born wife Ruth Decoster(1742–1833). John Mackay learned the shipping trades as a young man from his father and his uncle Mungo Mackay. John Mackay became a member of the Boston Marine Society on February 3, 1796. During this early period he sailed ships to foreign ports to obtain cargo for the Boston market. He was aided by the trade contacts his uncle Mungo Mackay had built up, and by some of the sons of Mungo Mackay who were located on islands in the Caribbean as agents. He ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jonas Chickering
Jonas Chickering (April 5, 1798 – December 8, 1853) was a piano manufacturer in Boston, Massachusetts. Jonas Chickering was born in Mason Village, and raised in nearby New Ipswich, New Hampshire where his father Abner Chickering kept a farm and worked as a blacksmith. Chickering apprenticed three years as a cabinet maker with John Gould. In 1818 Chickering removed to Boston with Gould's permission, working for cabinet-maker James Baker, but one year later began working for pianomaker John Osborn at 12 Orange Street. In 1823, Chickering formed a partnership with pianomaker James Stewart; they produced 15 pianos the first year at workshops at 20 Common street and sold their first piano on June 23, 1823 for $275. Stewart & Chickering dissolved after four years, and in 1830 Chickering became associated with John Mackay, a merchant, as well as organ and pianomaker who had worked with Alpheus Babcock, doing business as Chickering & Co. at 416 Washington street. In 1837 Chickeri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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