Images(2)

Clarinet, C

Date1830-1841 ca.

Place MadeLondon, England, Europe

Serial No.none

SignedStamped on bell: [unicorn head] / H – WREDE / 35 / LR WHITECROSS ST. / CRIPPLEGATE / LONDON / C Stamped on joints: H – WREDE / LONDONMarkingsnoneDescription5 sections: barrel, top joint, middle joint, bottom joint, bell. Simple system; 5 brass keys with flat, square covers, mounted in rings, with flat springs attached to keys; boxwood (?) body; ivory ferrules.

Herman(n) Wrede (1770-1841) was an established and renowned woodwind and piano manufacturer, and sales agent operating in London. His son Herman Wrede (1809-1873) eventually worked in the family business from 1835 at least until 1857. Instruments bearing the Wrede stamp were distributed as far as Australia, as attested by the journal account of Robert William Wrede (1817-1857), Herman's third son.
DimensionsBarrel: 52 mm
Upper joint: 165 mm
Middle joint: 94 mm
Lower joint: 114 mm
Bell: 99 mm
(all measurements exclude tenons)
ProvenanceThe donor Laura Johnson Whelan (1897-1993) donated this clarinet to the NMM in memory of her grandfather Randall Johnson (1822-1900), whose ancestry can be traced back to 17th century Scotland. Their ancestors arrived in New England around 1730, and settled in Maine.

The clarinet belonged to Laura’s great-grandfather Robert Rich Johnson (1799-1874), a farmer who probably acquired it while residing in Gorham, Maine, via some dealer store (perhaps in nearby Portland) that distributed Wrede instruments. Robert seems to have passed on the musical taste to his son, Randall Johnson, who also played this clarinet. In 1855, Randall relocated the family to Shiocton village, by the Wolf River in Wisconsin, where he established important saw and shingle mill businesses that had a large contribution to the development of that village. Laura fondly remembered how her grandfather – “a delightful old man who always carried Horehound Candy in his pocket” – gave flooring, siding and shingles to any immigrant coming through, but with the condition that they would stop and settle there as well. Randall also contributed to building the first church and school there, where he first taught Sunday school and had an “old fashioned Singing School.” The family moved to Appleton sometime around 1871, and later to other Wisconsin areas such as Waukesha and Fond du Lac.

Laura “re-discovered” the clarinet in her sister’s attic who lived in Elgin, Illinois, sometime around the early 1940s.
Published References"New Galleries, Concerts, Acquisitions... 1986 --- A Year to Remember." _The Shrine to Music Museum Newsletter_ 14, no. 2 (January 1987): 2.

Credit LineGift of Laura Johnson Whelan, 1986

Object number03995

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