BOWS ON THE BAY

With a large and growing music community, the San Francisco Bay Area became a hotbed of violin and bow making talent in the early 20th century. Raphael Gold tells the stories of the most prominent bow makers of the day

John Aschow at his workshop in 1912, with elder son John Jr, born in 1910. He was also assisted by his wife Laura, who ran the shop after his death in 1939; their other son Stanley, born in 1911; and an assistant, Ed Loebrich, who also made bows, always stamped with his name. A third son, Edwin, did not work in the shop.

COURTESY RAPHAEL GOLD

Right from its raucous Gold Rush beginnings in 1848, music was everywhere in San Francisco. Italian immigrants brought European opera, Chinese immigrants brought Cantonese opera and German immigrants brought symphonic traditions. Fiddle music from across the country could be heard in seemingly every corner. A love of string music was stitched into the very fabric of the city, driven by a fledgling society that aspired to high culture. Over the years a multitude of venues proliferated: concert halls; first- and second-class theatres; burlesque theatres; silent movie theatres; saloons; salons; restaurants and vaudeville stages all supported a vibrant scene. These Bay Area musicians relied on luthiers to repair and make their instruments, just as they needed bows to play them. The bow makers who worked here were an integral partof a musical ecosystem that changed dramatically from the time the first such maker arrived in 1876 to the end of World War II in 1945. Here are some of the bow makers who did their part in turning the region from a capital of the Wild West into a destination point for international musicians.

The very first bow maker in the San Francisco Bay Area was Pierre Aloysius Josephs. He was born in 1833 in New York, his father a prominent builder. Moving west with his family, Pierre studied violin in St Louis, Missouri, probably in the early 1850s. He developed a keen interest in violin making around this time. Eventually the family relocated to Elwood, Kansas, where he fought in the Civil War for the Union in 1861, a first lieutenant of the First Regiment Kansas Volunteer Infantry. He registered his profession as ‘jeweler’ in the 1863 Kansas military draft, an exacting and precise art that would inform his skill.

According to the family, he honed his abilities as a violin and bow maker during a series of business trips to Paris between 1864 and 1872, where he spent time at the shop of Jean-Baptiste Vuillaume. This claim is backed by an Ellis Island document from 1864; the influence is also clear in his workmanship. As early as 1870 he was working as a violin maker in St Joseph, Missouri, as listed in the local directory. He worked around St Joseph until 1876, when he boarded the newly incorporated railway line from St Louis to San Francisco with his nonagenarian parents, his second wife and their seven children. At first he settled in Oakland, California, moving to bustling San Francisco in 1877. He soon set up as a violin and bow maker at 1412 Kearny Street, in a three-generation household.

While his primary motive for moving west was to watch over his active, elderly parents, he may also have been motivated by the mild weather. In an 1886 newspaper article he credited California’s climate for the success of his instruments, and briefly mentioned his bow making in San Francisco – the first mention of bow making in the region.

Pierre Aloysius, who also went by the name Peter, worked variously as a clerk, salesman and merchant, in addition to being a violin maker in California. Yet his skill was good enough for Vuillaume to recommend him to August Wilhelmj as the best repairman in the West; the great violinist was exuberant about Josephs’ skill in a letter from 8 December 1881: ‘I have been anxious to tell you… of the extraordinary success your labors have obtained.’

The evidence shows that Pierre Aloysius was a successful violin and bow maker in the early years of San Francisco.

Throughout his time there he continued travelling to New York and even Europe –a huge and expensive undertaking in those days. In 1885 he returned from a European trip where he undoubtedly worked with his Parisian luthier and archetier contacts. He remained in San Francisco for eleven years, returning to New York with his second wife and their younger children in 1888. He died there in 1898.

Pierre Aloysius had two sons from his first wife who stayed in the Bay Area, where they laid down roots. John was a noted violinist and a founding member of the San Francisco Symphony in 1911. His other son, James Arnold Josephs, born in 1859 in Elwood, Kansas, learnt violin and bow making from his father. They worked together in San Francisco until he took over the shop when his father moved back to New York in 1888.

By 1898 James had ‘earned a reputation as a maker of fine violin bows’, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. This was an important achievement. Making violins and bows starting in 1877, and associated with his acclaimed father, James did not advertise his business. Customers knew of him by word of mouth, the quality of his work and repairs, allowing him to stay in business for decades. His reputation was certainly bolstered by that of his violinist brother John.

Josephs continued working on Kearny Street in San Francisco from 1877 to 1902, when he moved his residence and workshop across the bay to Alameda, and later Oakland. A dependable presence in the East Bay string world, James worked there, with a brief respite around 1930, right up until his death in 1943, aged 84.

While it is known that Pierre Aloysius made bows in San Francisco, none have yet been located. This bow, made after he moved to New York, shows the clear influence of the Voirin school. The head is elegant, almost delicate, with a long nose. The chamfer is crisp and clean. The frog is well proportioned. The collar of the button fits the stick perfectly, though the rest of the button is a bit larger than the butt end of the stick.

PIERRE JOSEPHS PHOTOS JOHN BIRCHARD. JAMES JOSEPHS PHOTOS COURTESY JOSEPHS FAMILY

Stylistically, this bow is not as elegant as the other, yet Josephs’ perfectionism is on full display. Also made after his move to New York, this bow has a short nose in proportion to the head. The chamfer is quite clean. Because he was not a fulltime bow maker like his mentors in France, he had the freedom to experiment with different head styles and different cuts of wood – in this case, pernambuco cut on the slab. Interestingly, he stamped his name upside down on this bow.

This bow shows James Josephs was a good maker with an eccentric sense of style. The head is boxy, reminiscent of Thomas Tubbs, though the curve of the head is deeply concave. James probably did not stamp many of his bows.

John Nelson Aschow was by far the most influential violin and bow maker working in the East Bay during his lifetime. He had the largest and most established shop in the area and a large, varied clientele. Aschow was born Jens Nielsen Askov, in the hamlet of Malt, Denmark, on 26 April 1881. His father, Niels Peder Nielsen Askov, was a skilled carpenter and taught all his sons woodworking. It appears John never left the immediate area surrounding the town of Askov, his namesake, until he immigrated to Oakland in 1903. He was probably introduced to stringed instruments by a schoolteacher, or perhaps by an amateur maker in his native region. In his immigration documents, he listed himself variously as a snedker (carpenter), and a joiner; his widow, Laura Aschow, explained in a 1969 interview that he made his first guitar when he was 17, and learned violin making in Denmark before crossing the Atlantic. He taught himself bow making only after settling in California.

As with most young professionals, Aschow worked hard to establish himself, moving several times early in his California career. By 1906 he had opened his own shop out of his house on 1503 Park Street in Alameda, the first time his name appears in any city directory. By 1909 he had moved a couple of blocks down the street, to 1242 Park Street. His first big move came in 1911, moving off Alameda Island to 1703 Grove Street (now Martin Luther King Jr Way) in Oakland. It was here that he first advertised as a bow maker.

Oakland at this time had a growing musical tradition, with the already well-established Oakland Conservatory of Music attracting an ever increasing number of students; there were also more and more musical societies promoting classical concerts.

Several roadways intersected at the centrally located Grove Street. In 1906, five years before Aschow’s move, San Francisco was destroyed by a massive earthquake and fires, forcing thousands of wealthy residents to relocate across the bay (from 1900 to 1910 the population of Oakland more than doubled).

Many of them stayed in the East Bay, becoming clients. In 1914 Aschow moved into his long-time residence/workshop on 2311 Grove Street, a building he purchased from a prominent Oakland resident. This Victorian mansion was to become legendary for the city’s musicians.

Aschow’s fame had been growing steadily since he first opened his shop. In 1910 he wrote an op ed in The Violinist, a national monthly, thrusting his name into the national conversation. In 1913, Alfred Metzger, the erudite and opinionated editor of the influential Pacific Coast Musical Review, praised Aschow for his success as a violin maker. His shop’s reputation had grown so much that travelling performers would pay a visit. These included Eugène Ysaÿe when he was on concert tour in 1913, where he performed at the Greek Theater in Berkeley.

In 1969 the Oakland Tribune said, ‘here in Oakland… the senior Aschow found renown as a bow maker.’ The quality of his bows was something of a local secret, used by the city’s musicians. ‘It’s a greater art to make a bow than a violin,’ his sons recalled him saying during their apprenticeship.

While we know that Aschow made 199 violins, it is not clear how many bows he made. Most likely, in the 28 years he was making bows, he simply did not make enough to survive posterity. With all the repair work, which included bowed and plectrum instruments, his contract work with the large music shop Kohler & Chase, which ran at least until 1916 and undoubtedly beyond, in addition to his violin making and dealing, it is hard to imagine that he made more than 300 bows branded with his name. Interestingly, according to author and pedagogue Harvey Whistler, Aschow also made bows for the Chicago-based firm Lyon & Healy, though again, how many he may have furnished remains unknown. Aschow died on 21 October 1939, aged 58.

‘IT’S A GREATER ART TO MAKE A BOW THAN A VIOLIN’

The above advertisement for John Nelson Aschow’s violin and bow shop is taken from the 1911 edition of the Polk-Husted Directory Company’s directory of businesses for the Oakland, Berkeley and Alameda area.

This is a classic example of Aschow’s mature bow work. The bottom of the head angles sharply upward while the back of the head is upright. The wood is choice, and very typical of his bows. Many of his bows are gold mounted. The thumb projection is fairly short and slants upward. The metal work on his buttons could vary from bow to bow, in this case having a simple double collar with one band smaller than the other. The frog has a full pearl slide and back heel plate, an artistic touch unique within his oeuvre.

This Aschow head has the same basic shape as the other bow, though is a bit thicker from front to back. The same type of wood is used, seemingly from the same log. Like his other bows, the metal slide is affixed with iron screws. The stamp is also deep and clear, meant to last through heavy use. The engraving on the gold was likely done by a local engraver.

ASCHOW PHOTOS ALEX DUMITRACHE

Born on 11 November 1875 (according to his WWI draft card), August Albin Nürnberger was one of the few bow makers to immigrate to the US with a firmly established reputation in Europe. He had bow makers of generational talent on both sides of the family, and from early in his career he showed the promise of similar skill. He studied with his father, Adolf Christian Nürnberger, from 1890 to 1895, before working for his maternal grandfather, the prolific Johann Christian Suess, until 1900. August then set up in his native Markneukirchen, as generations of bow makers had in the past, and worked there until he immigrated to California, with his wife Anna and their three children, Frederick, Margarite and Marie, as well as his younger brother, bow maker Adolf Otto, in 1912.

Why did he move? In the final analysis, California’s economic opportunities – including close, personal contacts from Germany, a protectionist set of tariffs on imported musical goods, and ease of land acquisition – were too hard to ignore.

Arriving at the Port of New York on 22 August 1912, he declared to US customs officials he was joining his brother-inlaw, violin maker Richard Schubert of San Francisco. Anna was Richard’s sister; famed bow maker Paul Schubert, who worked with August for several years in Germany, was Richard and Anna’s brother. Richard himself had moved to San Francisco in 1900 (according to the 1930 census) where at one point he headed the violin department at Sherman Clay & Company.

He established his own thriving violin shop there in 1910, working alongside another brother, Christian Wilhelm Schubert, who may have made some bows as well; Richard was keenly aware that the region lacked a formally trained bow maker. August understood the favourable economic prospects in California, and having an established contact such as Richard was an attractive consideration.

The primary ‘pull factor’ was the onerous import tax of 45 per cent on all manner of musical gear, including bows for stringed instruments, which was US law before WWI. While it is known that German imports to America were vast at this time, the US government was nevertheless protectionist, and wanted to encourage local production of musical goods. Being intrepid enough to resettle from the old country to America, August enjoyed economic success that was virtually protected by the US government. Rather than rely on middlemen to export bows to America, choosing to settle in an expanding market allowed him to turn more profit.

He was the only man in the entire state before WWII, and quite possibly the Western United States, who finished a formal, full-time apprenticeship with master bow makers in the old country. Vocal supporters of the arts, including the editors of the musical press, were beside themselves with joy that such a maker had moved to the area. The cadre of local musicians needed high-quality bows, and having a local bow maker of international stature was a blessing for them.

Known professionally as August Nürnberger-Suess, he focused his business locally at first, as there were enough clients in the region to support his craft. In particular, the substantial and influential German musical community would have been enthusiastic customers, but string players of all stripes benefited greatly. This would have included members of the newly formed San Francisco Symphony, which gave its first performance in December 1911. The Bay Area was still in its cultural adolescence at this time, and more than any other maker to settle there, August Nürnberger-Suess brought a sense that the region was on the path to cosmopolitan maturity.

August Nürnberger-Suess quickly established himself as a bow maker. He first advertised his bows in May 1913, about nine months after he arrived on American soil, and ran this ad regularly from 1913 to 1916. In later years, he may have also imported bows from Germany, stamping them ‘August Nürnberger’. These bows appear to be of lesser quality than those he stamped with his full brand.

This cello bow is a classic example of Nürnberger-Suess’s work in California before about 1925. His work is crisp and confident, the stick lively and of nice wood. Stylistically the head differs from his German work, with the top of the head projecting roundly, the nose thin and long. Like this one, his earlier ferrules have a solder line on the top, and his slides are affixed with screws. The ebony on the three-piece button has a crack, which is typical. By 1931 one of his cello bows was advertised in the Rudolph Wurlitzer catalogue at $35.

ALL NÜRNBERGER-SUESS PHOTOS ALEX DUMITRACHE/COURTESY LOVELAND VIOLINS

Nürnberger-Suess’s style did not remain static: head models could vary, the finish of the stick could be brilliant or dry, and the metalwork of the button ranged from a simple scribed line to a single or double collar. This bow has been darkened artificially, and has a lustrous finish. Again the top of the head is quite full, though the overall head is more reclined. The ferrule is gently rounded.

Apart from bow making, August made a fine living working the land –a secondary consideration for settling in California.

Above Stephen Ogden Allison in his San Francisco shop in 1927, working on a new instrument of his creation called the tenora.

Below A 1928 advertisement for Allison’s business in The Violinist

Left This card is from John Nelson Aschow’s long-time address on Grove Street. (now Martin Luther King Jr Way). Customers who remember visiting the shop all describe the pungent aroma of varnish, which was always cooking on the bottom floor.

Left Pierre Aloysius Josephs in his shop in 1890. The workbench, still in the possession of the family, is not shown in the portrait. Note the hunting rifle by his side, at the ready.

Above This safe was used to house many of the violins for sale at the Aschow shop. Customers have said it was one of the first things they saw upon entering. It is still in regular daily use at a Bay Area violin shop, 115 years later.

Above Portrait of Pierre Aloysius Josephs taken in San Francisco in 1884

Above This hand-made brass sign, one of two fabricated by James Josephs, was wrapped around a column that stood in front of his shop on 410 Kearny Street, San Francisco

NÜR NBERGER-SUESS WAS THE ONLY MAN IN CALIFORNIA WHO FINISHED A BOW MAKING APPRENTICESHIP IN THE OLD COUNTRY

He split his time between bow making and farming, a feat made possible as his son Frederick – ten years old when they immigrated – grew older and could assist in both lines of work. August died on 11 December 1944 following a brief illness.

Alfred Eugene Lanini, born on 11 January 1891 (according to his death certificate) was known mostly as a violin maker, though his short-lived career as a bow maker had a lasting impact on the Bay Area. His only bow making student was John Bolander Jr, a prolific maker who in turn had a hand in teaching the next generation of bow makers including, among others, James Furey and Boyd Poulsen.

Lanini made bows for only around five years. He worked locally with Nürnberger-Suess in 1927 – probably visiting him regularly thereafter – before heading to France to work with Auguste Husson in 1928. According to Bolander, he only spent three months with Husson, but also spent time with Victor Fétique and Eugène Sartory. And while he developed his own ideas on bow making, he was a good student, a fact made clear in a letter from his teacher Celeste Farotti. Already a master of his tools, he absorbed what he could of the working methods of these French bow masters. According to his son, Henry Lanini, and separately Bolander Jr, Alfred made about 100 bows before an allergy to pernambuco dust forced him to stop in 1932.

Perhaps had he stuck with bow making he could have established a reputation. Nevertheless, he was one of the first American bow makers to seek out old-world traditional methods from established masters.

Stephen Ogden Allison was born on a farm in Hayes Township, Kansas, on 23 May 1872. He grew up repairing all manner of farm equipment, and like other talented American makers cut from the same cloth, such as Frank J. Callier, he was mostly self-taught. He first established himself as a violin maker in 1894 in St Joseph, Missouri, where he remained until 1903 when he set up in St Louis. By 1917 he had moved to Seattle, where he stayed at least until 1920. His WWI registration shows him as a pattern maker, a now essentially extinct profession that required great skill and a deep understanding both of woodworking and metallurgy. He continued his violin and bow making activities, where he could be found in local directories.

He then probably worked in Chicago from about 1920 to 1927.

In 1927 Allison relocated to San Francisco, where he moved into the shop of Ignaz Lutz, a Vienna-born maker of distinguished regional importance who suddenly died on 26 March that year. According to The Violinist, Lutz had ‘made about $1,500 per month clear’, emphasising San Francisco’s commercial opportunities.

Most of Lanini’s bows were made with a swan head, though he made several on the Tourte model. The workmanship of the above bow is clean and well proportioned. The curves of the head, just like the stick, are round and smooth. He was known to have stamped his bows with and without the period at the end, frequently but not always using the same brand stamp he used in his violin making. He was very proud of the fact that he made every aspect of his bows himself rather than modify commercial fittings.

SAFE, LANINI AND ALLISON PHOTOS COURTESY RICHARD WARD

Allison’s bows are not commonly seen. This bow shows a discerning eye for wood quality. The bow’s style is just eccentric enough to show a talented hand unguided by a formal apprenticeship.

Allison’s shop was successful for the short time he worked in San Francisco, where he made bows and built a new type of instrument which he called the ‘tenora’. In 1935, just after the height of the Depression, the 62-year-old violin maker went out of business. Allison’s Violin Shop, as it was known, sold everything. He retired to Oakland, where he had been living since at least 1931, and probably continued doing repair work out of his home. He died in 1954.

These bow makers had a large, if understated, role in the development of the Bay Area as an international centre of music. The Bay Area attracted world-famous performers: violinist Eduard Reményi died on stage following a vaudeville performance in 1898; Enrico Caruso performed the role of Don José in Carmen the night of the great earthquake in 1906; the examples abound. By the 1920s however, more permanent luminaries settled in the region: Ernst Bloch led the young SF Conservatory starting 1925; Pierre Monteux took the baton of the SF Symphony in 1936; Darius Milhaud headed the music department of Mills College beginning in 1940. The archetiers before 1945, from such diverse backgrounds as their clients, provided much-needed tools to the string players they served. And their work formed the early building blocks of today’s musical Bay Area.

The author wishes to thank Ifshin Violins, the Josephs family, Loveland Violins, Josef Gabriel, Klaus Grünke, Yung Chin and Jens Stenz for their help with this article