THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



standpoint of tlie European climate as well as the demands of the 

 limited compass then known. Allen and Thoms later on improved 

 upon their first patent, but not before they had been anticipated 

 in this country by Alpheus Babcock, a piano-maker of Bos- 

 ton, whose invention Jonas Chickering subsequently perfected. 

 Probably it was the obvious inability of London-made pianos to 

 stand oiir climate, or the intrinsic defects in the system of case- 

 building then in vogue, which attracted the attention of American 

 piano-makers as early as 1790, when cases were put together with 

 screws instead of glue in Philadelphia ; anyway, it has long been a 

 subject of pardonable pride to American piano-makers to know 

 that the problem referred to was solved in this country. 



Fk 



11.— The Albrecrt Piano, a. d. 1789. Pennsylvania Historical Society. Made in 

 Philadelphia by Charles Albrecht. One of the oldest American pianos known. 



In 1775 John Behreiit, of Philadelphia, announced that "he 

 had finished an extraordinary instrument by the name of the 

 piano-forte in mahogany, in the manner of the harpsichord." This 

 was probably the first piano made in America. James Julian 

 came forward in 1784, when the Revolutionary War had just been 

 concluded, and advertised the great "American piano-forte of his 

 own invention." In 1789 a piano-forte made liy George Ulshofer, 

 a German musician and musical instrument maker and repairer, 

 was exhibited by him in Corre's City Tavern, New York. Some 

 time before this year Charles Albrecht began making pianos in 

 Philadelphia, many notable specimens of which exist to-day. One 

 stands in the Art Rooms of the Philadelphia Historical Society, 

 dated 1789, and another was presented by the late Mr. Drexel to 

 the New York Museum of Art. 



