After having designed and built a few instruments of my own over the years (electric guitars and basses), I found this story fun and interesting and thought I’d share it with you. Recently in a New York dumpster (great way to start eh?) a woman came across an old, dirty, broken down harp with rusty strings and a tattered finish. The woman opted to bring it home and clean it up a bit. After using some wood floor soap and some elbow grease, the story goes on to say...
“ she discovered not only clusters of hand-painted gold shamrocks climbing the column and soundboard, but a brass plaque bearing the name of the instrument’s maker, John Egan, and an address on Dawson Road in Dublin.
Egan, who is thought to have made instruments from the late 1700s until about 1840, is seen by many as the father of the modern Irish harp. In the 19th century his instruments were used by nationalist balladeers, like the poet Thomas Moore, who wrote “The Harp that Once Through Tara’s Halls.” Today universities and museums collect them”.
It turns out that the instrument was previously owned by none other than Rose Augustine, the former president of the old Augustine guitar string factory in New York. She died in 2003. She, along with her husband, developed the first nylon classical guitar strings (there had to be a classical connection somewhere), anyway…these same strings where popularized in the 1940s by the great Spanish guitarist Andrés Segovia and soon became the standard for classical guitar player’s world wide. This lucky lady finally sold the harp which is believed to be from around 1820, for around $300 (not bad for a dumpster find) and was able to find a buyer who fell in love with the instrument and would have it restored by an expert. So… as the saying goes,
“One persons trash is truly another’s treasure”!!
Till next time, thanks for listening:
Mark Calder
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