A few more details on this subject, started by Don Teach yesterday,
for those interested in minutia:  The Marquette Piano Co. of Chicago,
founded by Axel Larson and his brother shortly after 1900, was an
early maker of pushup piano players and player actions for other
piano companies.  When J. P. Seeburg, Oscar Nelson and Peder Wiggen
began working for Marquette in 1905, they worked together to develop
the Cremona coin-operated 'A' roll piano, and Seeburg operated them
on location all over the Chicago area.

Coin-operated pianos were so successful that Seeburg incorporated the
J.P. Seeburg Piano Co. in 1907 and became the exclusive distributor of
Cremona pianos.  In 1909 Seeburg, with Nelson as factory superintendent
and Wiggen as assistant superintendent, opened their own factory and
introduced the Seeburg coin-operated piano with Seeburg mechanisms.
The very first Seeburg mechanisms were installed in the same pianos as
the Cremona style 3, probably made by Smith & Barnes, also of Chicago.
Shortly thereafter, Seeburg began using pianos made by Haddorff, Edmund
Gram and Seybold.  Marquette probably continued buying them from
Smith & Barnes.

In the early 1920s Seeburg bought a building on Dayton Ave. and
began building its own pianos.  By then, Larson had sold the Marquette
Piano Co.  Seeburg's son Marshall graduated from college in 1921,
was appointed treasurer of the company, and gradually took over its
operation.  Nelson & Wiggen left and formed the Nelson-Wiggen Piano
Co. in 1922.  In 1924, Axel Larson and other previous officers of
the Marquette Piano Co. joined with Seeburg to build Western Electric
pianos as a secret subsidiary of Seeburg.  Although Western Electric
pianos have the same piano backs and pneumatic stacks as comparable
Seeburg models, other parts are very similar to Cremona parts, and in
some ways, it's appropriate to consider Western Electric pianos as
late style Cremonas with a different name.

Meanwhile, Smith & Barnes had turned into Smith, Barnes & Strohber,
and made its own brand of coin pianos, the Chicago Electric, using
pumps and spoolboxes purchased from Monarch Tool & Die in Kentucky.
The latter company is still in business making coin mechanisms.

This is covered in more detail, and illustrated with many professional
color photos in my book "The Golden Age of Automatic Musical Instruments."

I'm also working on a series of comprehensive illustrated articles
documenting the history of the Chicago area coin piano companies for
the Musical Box Society International (MBSI), to begin appearing in
a year or so.  This will finally consolidate 40 years of research,
including technical and historical data on over 1,200 known Seeburg
pianos, hundreds of Cremonas, Nelson-Wiggens, Western Electrics, Coinolas
and others; patent & design patent information; correspondence from
members of the original families; original factory literature; and
details gleaned from studying the complete run of Music Trade Review
magazines (donated to the MBSI by Q. David Bowers last year), servicing
over 200 Seeburg instruments and completely restoring about 25.

Art Reblitz