Electric Self Playing Piano Company 1897 signed by Electra Piano Inventor

Beautifully engraved RARE Certificate from the Electric Self Playing Piano Company issued in 1897. The company was incorporated out of New Jersey in 1895. This historic document was printed by the Albert B. King Company out of New York. The Certificate has an ornate border around it with a vignette of two women sitting on both sides of a shield. This item is hand signed by the company's President (Robert W. Lyle)and Treasurer (George Howlett Davis) and is over 107 years old. This is the earliest Electric Piano Certificate we have seen.




Certificate Vignette




Electric Piano Patent



George Howlett Davis was the holder of many patents for electric pianos and mechanical music devices issued in the late 1890s. He filed his patents between 1896 and 1903, numbers 733702, 739396 and 931281.

In addition, he is responsible for the following patents on the Electra Player Piano rolls (Standard Music Roll Co NJ) and a member of the company's Board of Directors.

659053 (02/10/1900 filed 02/09/1896) Composite perforating and recording device.

692989 (11/02/02 filed 17/04/01) Iron particle burner

703388 (01/07/02 filed 17/04/01) Stencil printing machine

703389 (01/07/02 filed 17/04/01) Stencil making machine

832849 (9/10/06 filed 22/04/01) Electric perforating machine

692834 (11/02/02 filed 09/08/01) Iron Particle burner

732279 (30/06/03 filed 14/10/01) Electrically controlled perforating machine.

709296 (16/9/02 filed 16/10/01) End fastener for music sheets

747858 (22/12/03 filed 20/03/02) Music sheet marking machine

745424 (01/12/03 filed 03/01/03) Tracing machine for rolls

747859 (22/12/03 filed 27/02/03) Compensating music spool

808274 (26/12/05 filed 27/02/03) Correcting Machine

747687 (22/12/03 filed 26/03/03) Music sheet line duplicator

811621 (06/02/06 filed 09/05/03) Automatic perforating machine

801932 (17/10/05 filed 10/12/04) Contact device for electric perforator

860965 (23/07/07 filed 19/01/07) Music roll spool

Much of this history was obtained from Adam Ramet at http://website.lineone.net/~agr/index2.html.