American Made Pianos

An Outstanding Manufacturing Tradition

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Melville Clark

Factory Location: Grand Haven, Michigan
Serial Number Dates: 1901 - 1937

History:

Melville Clark Piano Company was a spin-off company of Story & Clark. The company is also associated with Wurlitzer's first player grand (1904). The company was founded in 1901 and produced pianos for 36 years.

 

Information source: Pierce Piano Atlas

The Resonance of a Continent: The American Piano Tradition

The American piano manufacturing tradition is a story of unparalleled craftsmanship meeting the boundless natural resources of a new world. At its heart lies the selection of materials—most notably the vast, old-growth spruce forests of the Pacific Northwest and the Northeast. These superior stands of Sitka and Adirondack spruce provided the tight-grained, resonant timber essential for crafting the world’s finest soundboards, offering a tonal depth and "singing" quality that European makers envied. Combined with a relentless spirit of industrial innovation, American makers refined the overstrung scale and the heavy cast-iron plate, creating instruments of such structural integrity and powerful projection that they redefined the modern piano.