Timothy Gilbert
Timothy Gilbert (January 5, 1797 – July 19, 1865) was an American piano manufacturer, abolitionist and religious organizer in Boston, Massachusetts.
His funeral was held at the Tremont Temple at the expense of the Evangelical Baptist Benevolent and Missionary Society, both of which he had been instrumental in forming.
[12] In 1837 T. Gilbert & Co. were awarded a silver medal for one of the pianos they showed at the Exhibition of the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association, placed after fellow Boston manufacturers Chickering & Co., Wilkins & Newhall, and Hallet & Allen for the tone and slightly heavy touch of their piano,[13] but the company was removed from competition at the following exhibition for advertising "the fact, that they have not, to their knowledge, a personal friend among the selected judges.
[17] Piano historian Daniel Spillane described that this patent was for "a number of ideas and inventions relating to uprights and squares… and a number of lesser improvements which came to nothing", but considered the upright action significant because it "outlined many ideas afterward claimed by Wornum… in England",[18] referring to an 1842 patent by this manufacturer that Edgar Brinsmead dubbed the "tape-check action" in the 1879 edition of his History of the Pianoforte,[19] in which the last claim was for methods coupling the damper and hammer.
[22] Spillane described that Gilbert & Co. licensed the invention in 1846 "for a small figure"—an article about the inventor from January 1845 reported that the firm paid $25,000 for the exclusive rights to manufacture and sell pianos with it in Massachusetts, while New York manufacturers Nunns & Clark paid $25,000 in cash and offered $50,000 royalties for its use in the rest of the country.
In 1847 Gilbert patented a cast iron frame for grand pianos with the ordinary resisting bars combined with bars perpendicular to the strings—one of which was to be connected with the front edge of the sounding board—in order to prevent the case sides from twisting,[31] as well as a double action for horizontal pianos with springs meant to support the weight of the hammers and dampers in order to lighten the touch of the keys.
[32] In 1850 Gilbert listed $80,000 capital, with eighty workers and sales worth $112,500, ranking him the second largest piano manufacturer in Boston after Jonas Chickering.
[33] The Rich Men of Massachusetts, published in 1851, stated Gilbert had made more than 4,400 pianos to date, upwards 1,100 with the Aeolian attachment, and estimated his fortune as $100,000.
[35] In 1851 Gilbert patented actions for horizontal and vertical pianos where escapement was operated by a lower extension of the hammer butt instead of by a fixed button in order to reduce the number of parts to allow a lighter touch, and with an additional projection to limit the motion of the jack to improve repetition.
[37] Gilbert & Co. received honorable mention for a square piano with the Aeolian attachment at the 1851 London Exhibition,[38] a silver medal for the second best piano at the 1851 American Institute fair,[39] a diploma for an aelioan attachment at the 1852 American Institute fair[40] and a bronze medal for the third best square at the 1853 Exhibition of the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association.
This was intended to be offset by renting out four stores and a number of offices and studios, and the entire second story was occupied by the Young Men's Christian Association.
Ownership was transferred temporarily to a group of thirty-seven until the necessary subscriptions for a new society for the purpose were raised, and in June the deed was conveyed to trustees Thomas Richardson, Frederick Gould, J. W. Converse, G. W. Chipman and J. W. Merrill for $37,000 more than the outstanding liabilities.
Gilbert was elected treasurer and was charged with collecting funds that otherwise would be donated to the American Board of Foreign Missions—he explained later "the majority of the abolitionists have not so much objection to receive the money of slaveholders, as to be associated with them in evangelizing the world, and thus, by the copartnership, acknowledge them to be Christians in good standing in the Baptist church.
"[65] Gilbert sent funds to missionaries, including Adoniram Judson and Jonathan Wade, providing they affirmed they were abolitionists, and even proposed establishing missions entirely independent of the Board of Foreign Missions, but refrained from joining the American and Foreign Missionary Society (later called the American Baptist Free Mission Society)[66] which attracted many of his colleagues, stating "When I shall become convinced, that there is no good reason to hope that the old missionary organization will purge itself from the charge of receiving money in such a way as to enter into a copartnership with slaveholders, and giving its sanction to that wicked institution, then I shall be prepared to abandon them, not provisionally, but forever.
