Lyon & Healy Washburn question

[Mary Poe]

I inherited a Lyon & Healy Washburn harp from my grandmother. I have contacted Lyon & Healy to get some information on it, but I thought it might be good to ask here, as this seems to be a knowledgeable group.

The plate says Lyon & Healy Washburn and the serial # is W-115. I’ve exhausted my googling skills and haven’t seen another Washburn with a letter in the serial #, and the people I emailed with at Lyon & Healy seemed stumped as well. Does anybody have any leads for me, or any more information about this harp?

The information I’ve gathered is that the Washburn line was a very short-lived experiment in the early 1900s, and they were primarily student harps sold at a lower price point. I’ve been trying to get an accurate appraisal so that I can insure it properly.

Thanks in advance for any help, and I’m happy to send pictures or add them if that would help!

[carl-swanson]

I wrote a reply to this several hours ago. I have no idea where it went.

Washburns were made in the 1930’s for sale in retail music stores, not direct from the factory as the other Lyon & Healy models were. Lyon & Healy wanted to keep their name for themselves and for sales directly from the factory. So they came up with the name Washburn. I have no idea what or who that refers to. They have a serial number series that is separate from the usual Lyon & Healy series. The W in the serial number probably just means Washburn.

[Saul Davis Zlatkovski]

The Minneapolis Board of Education had a
Washburn harp on which I first studied pedal harp. Some of the pedal rods were broken, so I could only use certain pedals, or I had to manually return the pedal to its other position, maybe it was jammed. It had sadly been painted locker-green, and the sounding board was painted brown, so the sound was completely dulled. I wish I’d had the sense to take it and have it rebuilt. I think I might have asked and LH said it was not worth doing.

[KelsyAnne Schoenhaar]

My Model J is a semi-grand and was made in 1916. At that time they were making three harps. A small Irish harp – a small pedal harp… and a semi-grand. From what I understand… there were only about 100 Js made. It’s a truly lovely harp. It can’t use modern strings… but still has a huge sound. I think they stopped making them in 1917. They didn’t make semi-grand harps in the 30s.

[Saul Davis Zlatkovski]

I think Washburn was the name of either someone at the company, or a company that they took over. The early history of Lyon & Healy is very interesting and contains some surprises. Just as now, Lyon & Healy is not just a division of Salvi, but Lyon & Healy Corporation, which makes several lines of guitars and other things, which maybe what they needed the new building for.

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