Pam’s Pictorama Advertising Post: It is perhaps obvious to Pictorama readers, but I will start by stating that I like stuff. While I think of myself as a toy and photo collector (and those predominantly of cats, of course) I am also fascinated by what I guess you might call collectibles. These often fall in the category of advertising – give aways (pins, calendars, cards, rulers and the like) that would keep you in mind of a product or establishment. The disappearance of the flea market as this sort of collecting occurs more frequently online makes the finding and acquisition of such tidbits harder I believe, however I accept the challenge.

These items fall soundly in the category of you didn’t know you wanted it (or that it existed) until you saw it. I believe my favorite are the cat pin trays I discuss in my past post Corbin Canadian Cats. This was the sort of stuff I stumbled on and went nuts over as a kid and young adult, and I miss having as many opportunities to paw through piles of stuff and find such things. Nonetheless, necessity is the mother of invention and I have managed to find some interesting oddities online as well and here I present one today.

Of course it is this rather dignified looking kitty on this pin that attracted me and brought this item into my sphere. It is so interesting to me that cats have always been used to sell pretty much any and everything and this tom had been employed to hawk the N.Y. Band Instrument Co. While kitty is great I can’t help but point out that it is far superior and, for me, made irresistible by the little stitched holder he resides in. Tucked into this sleeve it is this way (and this way only) that we know that he was created to ply the wares of the N.Y. Band Instrument Co. Everything Musical, 111 East 14th Street, NEW YORK and 1225 Broadway, Brooklyn. I do wonder what it is that you would have been required to purchase at said establishment to earn you this little gem – a trumpet perhaps? Or just a pile of sheet music? Did folks immediately take it out of its holder (which they then lost) and poke it into their lapel? I know I would have. I was tempted to do it as soon as it arrived in the mail.

The internet does lend an interesting spin to this research and it was a matter of only seconds after inquiring before I was able to learn that the N.Y. Band Instrument Co. was once the largest music store in New York. The genesis of the company, originally known as the N.Y. Musical Instrument Company in its first incarnation, seems to have been a small import and maker of instruments which was born down the street from the address near Union Square, at 12 Cooper Square back in 1913.

Undated photo of the store front, Horn-u-copia.net

Steinway Hall at this address in 1875, this image from the Museum of the City of NY

The founders are noted to have been (Max) William Renz (a piano maker) and the Swiss born, Louis Ortlieb. The store on 14th Street appears to have been established by 1925 (I guess Steinway moved on) and the building included studios on the top floor which were rented to music teachers. It is a bit uncertain, but it would appear that they were in business in one form or another until 1950. The site of the building appears to have morphed into NYU dorms and is now apartments, according to the Zillow real estate site. (For these historical details I give a nod to the book, Spann’s Guide to Gibson 1902-1942, available online, and the site Horn-u-copia.) I was unable to find any information about the Brooklyn location, only that an African market currently claims the address.

This thriving establishment advertised frequently in the New York papers of the day, however it is a bit of patter from Jacob’s Band Monthly, in April of 1921, next to an ad for Toneking brass instruments placed by our friends at the New York Band Instrument Company , that best captures the spirit of music selling of the day and more,

SUMMING up the successful men of the past and present we find them all to be men of POWER It was power that won the world war. The most powerful engine the best success of an automobile and confidence are inspired by the of power. How can the beginner [of] the study of music gain this power? That is of the first questions with which the student is confronted. In trombone, power is attained in proportion to degree of control of the embouchure in words the better lip the more power will be to the tone and the less fatigue there be experienced. Power also comes from ability to concentrate regarding which I written previously I would now further every student to bear this subject in mind for when he has developed power of concentration his power to advance will be increased amazingly…