Robert Wornum

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Robert Wornum (1780-1852) was a piano maker working in London during the first half of the 19th century. He is best known for introducing small cottage and oblique uprights and an action used in many European uprights through the early 20th century sometimes referred to as the birdcage action. Art historian Ralph Nicholson Wornum (1812-1877) was his son.

Robert Wornum was born on 1 October 1780, son of music seller and violin maker Robert Wornum (1742-1815), who worked at 42 Wigmore Street, near Cavendish Square, London. Hipkins wrote that he was originally intended for the church, but by 1810 was foreman at Wilkinson & Co., music sellers at 3 Great Windmill Street with warerooms at 13 Haymarket, who in 1809, due to "the great increase of their manufactory of pianos" had determined to close down their other musical enterprises, and had reduced their entire stock of music to half price and offered favorable terms on all instruments out on hire at the time.

Wilkinson & Wornum and the Unique upright

In 1810 George Wilkinson borrowed £12,000 to form a partnership with Wornum, and leased houses at 315 Oxford street and Princes street, adjoining Hanover Square, for warerooms and a factory as well as residences, with the yard behind 11 Princes street used for seasoning lumber.

In 1811 Wornum patented a small diagonally strung upright with two strings per note about three feet three inches tall (99 cm) styled the "unique". In William Southwell's sticker action, patented 1807 and used in tall cabinet uprights, the escapement was attached to the key and acted against the padded lower end of the long sticker hinged at the top to the butt of the hammer lever. Wornum's escapement worked directly upon a padded notch on the hammer butt. The hammer was returned to its resting position by a spring fixed to the hammer rail instead of by the weight of the sticker. Like Southwell, Wornum used overdampers with the damper levers hinged from a crosswise rail above the hammers and wires to communicate the motion of the key, but these were acted upon by the backward oriented base of the escapement instead of by the sticker. These 5½ octave pianos were arranged so that the front of the piano, with the keys and action could be unlatched and swung away from the strung portion; the right hand pedal raised the dampers as usual, while the left pedal muted all of the left hand strings, which Colt identified as a device for tuning purposes because the arrangement of the action prevented the strings to be muted off in the ordinary manner.

Wilkinson & Wornum's Oxford street facilities were destroyed by fire in October 1812, and the proprietors quickly announced that their undamaged stock could still be purchased at 11 Princes street, but the workmen had lost of all of their tools and were unable to return to work. At a meeting of their creditors in November, Wilkinson's father, Charles Wilkinson, agreed not to make a claim against them and guaranteed payment to the other creditors, and in early 1813 he forgave what the partners' owed him. Wilkinson established his own piano factory behind his new house at 32 Howland street, and Wornum, apparently having sold his patent to music seller John Watlen, of Leicester place, removed to 42 Wigmore street.

The Cottage and Piccolo uprights, equal tension, and the tape check action

In 1813 Wornum introduced a second upright design with vertical strings, measuring about four feet six inches tall (137 cm), originally called the "harmonic" and later the cottage upright. In 1820 he patented a system of equal tension achieved by using a single gauge of wire for all the treble strings, and carefully predetermined wound bass strings, which he claimed would remain in tune better than pianos with different gauges and tensions in different parts of their scale.

In 1826 he patented improvements to what he called the professional piano, including a single action, a version of the sticker action with an additional lever carrying a backcheck operating against the hammer head and which raised the damper wire, and a double action, with a similarly arranged backcheck lever, but with an escapement on the principle of the English grand action mounted on a separate crank lever hinged from the hammer rail, and with this lever tied to the hammer by a "dog spring... to keep the hammer from dancing after the blow," the earlier fixed hammer return spring being omitted, as well as a pizzicato pedal placed between the two ordinary pedals with linkages to press the dampers against the strings. Two years later he patented further improvements to the sticker action implemented by extending the lower lever of the sticker so it could be checked by a button fastened to the key.

According to Hipkins Wornum perfected his crank, or "tied" or tape check double action in 1829, and introduced it in both cabinet and three feet eight inch tall (112 cm) piccolo uprights the following year. This action replaced the spring from the 1826 double action with a flexible tie fastened to the hammer butt and to a wire mounted on the crank lever. The crank lever also operated a check working against an extension of the hammer butt and raised the damper wire.

Wornum's improvements in uprights were adopted sooner on the Continent than in England - obliquely strung uprights were introduced by Roller & Blanchet at the 1827 Exposition in Paris, Camille Pleyel started imitating English pianos, including small vertically strung uprights after Wornum's pattern in the early 1830s, and Hermann Lichtenthal received the first patent for a tape check double action in 1832. Hipkins related that Pleyel's success caused the double action to be called the "French action" in England, and by 1880 it had been generally adopted in France and Germany and he predicted it would probably even replace Southwell's sticker action in England.

Double action grands and downstriking actions

In 1830 Wornum leased buildings at 15 and 17 Store street, Bedford Square, for a new factory. By 1832 he opened a music hall at number 16, and by 1838 offered patent double action piccolo, cottage and cabinet uprights for up to 75 guineas, as well as 5 foot 4 inch long (163 cm) pocket and 7 foot 10 inch (237 cm) imperial grands for up to 75 and 90 guineas respectively. The success of his piccolo piano had "induced certain manufacturers to announce and sell instruments of a different character under the same name, by which the public [was] deceived". The new 6-octave pocket and 6½ octave imperial grands were constructed not only with the strings above the hammers but with an entirely separate structure hinged at the spine so that the wrestplank, wood frame, sounding board and bridges were all placed above the strings, forming a rigid uninterrupted construction similar to what he would later use in downstriking pianos. They were furnished with tape check double actions arranged like those of the uprights.

Wornum later improved his grand actions by adding a sustaining spring tying the hammer butt and the short end of the crank lever, intended to improve repetition and "assist in the forte, but eventually abandoned the inverted construction due to its inconvenient form and turned his attention instead to manufacturing "overstruck" or downstriking horizontal pianos, where the hammers are located above the strings. In 1842 he patented the application of a similarly tied pivoting hammer return spring to downstriking actions for grands and squares, and included claims for a new disposition of the crank lever and escapement, as well as a method of operating the damper in uprights either with a leather strip attached to the hammer butt or a wire attached to the key.

Robert Wornum & Sons

At the 1851 London Exhibition Robert Wornum & Sons exhibited cottage uprights, and downstriking bichord semi-grand and square pianos. Their Albion semi-grand was noted as a good example of how the downstriking action allowed for a simpler and more economical construction without metallic bracing, and they were awarded a prize medal for their improved piccolo piano.

Wornum died on 29 September 1852. He was succeeded by his son Alfred Nicholson Wornum.

In 1856 A. N. Wornum patented improvements to downstriking actions with a spring keeping the crank lever in constant contact with the key, as well as a new arrangement for the regulating button and a method for improving repetition. Robert Wornum & Sons exhibited cottage and grand pianos at the 1862 International Exhibition in London, as well as a "folding" square piano arranged on a stand so that it could swing up and out of the way when not in use, receiving a medal for "novelty of invention in piano", and they exhibited a piccolo upright, as well as moderately priced downstriking grand and square pianos without metal bracings at the 1867 Universal Exposition in Paris. where they were awarded a bronze medal.

In 1875 A. N. Wornum patented improvements in grands with the orientation of the hammer levers reversed from the ordinary English arrangement in order to permit longer strings relative to the size of the piano, and along with a piccolo upright, displayed short and full size grands on this plan at the 1878 Universal Exposition in Paris, for which the company was awarded a silver medal.

By 1889 Robert Wornum & Sons was under the direction of Wornum's grandson, also named A. N. Wornum. Harding lists 1900 as the year their last entry in the London directories as piano manufacturers.

References

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