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In trying to characterize the time period from 1953 to 1961 in the life of the Company, I would call it a stable time marked by steady growth. Actually, Allen Organ Company was a minor player at that time. Other companies such as Hammond, Conn, Baldwin, and Wurlitzer had well-established names. In order to compete and grow, we had to do "our thing" better than the other guys. We "felt" our way regarding the specifics. However, the basic policies and principles which were learned in the prior years still formed the foundation for our philosophy of operation—no layoffs occurred, the products were built to last, and the organs sounded and acted more like pipe organs than any other non-pipe instruments. We were not only leaders in technological innovation but also kept our productivity high by hiring good people and judiciously expanding and improving our physical plant.
We were also set apart from our competition in the early years because of another important difference. Allen Organ Company catered to the individual needs of its customers, whereas our competitors tended to think more in terms of standard "off-the-shelf" products. For example, as far back as 1947, we built the world's first three-manual electronic organ because that was what the customer wanted. Incidentally, that organ went to St. Paul's Lutheran Church in Catasauqua, Pennsylvania, and served them for thirty-three years; it was replaced with a new Allen in 1980. We even went on to build four-manual electronic organs. The other companies seemed to exclusively produce the smaller two-manual organs first popularized by Hammond. We also built the smaller two-manual organs, but we continued to emulate pipe organs as I had done from the very beginning. For those seeking an institutional organ, as opposed to a home organ, Allen offered a tempting alternative to a pipe organ. The customer could get an instrument that had a standard pipe organ console. It played like a pipe organ and sounded much like a pipe organ; but it cost much less and produced fewer problems than a pipe organ. It's certainly true that we constantly came up against the prejudice of purists—sometimes but not always the organist—regarding anything "electronic." However, for many churches on tight budgets, we offered the best alternative to a "real" pipe organ. In these cases, it was a choice between an Allen Organ or no organ at all, given the realities of the economics involved.
Obviously, a lot of work went into building the Company from 1953 to 1961. Because space does not permit a lengthy recitation of everything that happened during those years, I will only touch on some random highlights—humorous, technological, marketing—to give the reader a flavor of that time period.
Mr. and Mrs. Harold Steinbright of Cedars, Pennsylvania, traded their Allen "Original Organ" of 1945 on a new Allen.
One of the important technical developments which influenced this time frame was the "Gyrophonic Projector." I developed and patented this rotating speaker system around 1949 in order to add a "liveliness" to the sound of the electronically generated pipe tones. The Gyrophonic Projector was a big success. Organ experts such as Dr. William H. Barnes lauded the development. Dealers and customers were favorably impressed. Competitors, caught off guard, were rather creative in quickly dreaming up "problems" connected with the "Gyro." The "Gyro" supposedly "induced nausea" because of "motion fatigue." The "Gyro" somehow interfered with the heating system of the church, which in turn caused numerous head colds in the choir. However, in spite of these initial attacks, many competitors soon followed suit and offered some form of "speakers-in-motion" arrangement themselves.
Aside from the improvement made in the sound, the Gyrophonic Projector could be turned on and off by the organist. This deceptively insignificant fact is really very important, for I learned long ago that people of all levels of expertise can't "remember" the subtleties of different sounds for more than a brief time. Having a tonal-improvement feature which can be turned on and off is a great way to get around this difficulty. Listeners can easily perceive the improvement because they don't have to retain any of the different sounds in their memories very long. Turning the effect on and off gives a relatively instantaneous comparison—with no "remembering" involved.
A related situation exists when people are required to choose from among several different organ manufacturers and/or models. We found that doing side-by-side demonstrations was a good way to alleviate the "remembering" problem. Again, listeners could get relative comparisons instantaneously if the two organs being compared were sitting side-by-side. Allen consistently won most of these side-by-side demonstrations, including an "international" side-by-side held in 1956, where we competed against a European rival.
Furthermore, a fascinating sidelight to the Gyrophonic Projector story exists. Early in the development of the system, I was searching for a quiet, multiple-speed, AC motor to turn the speaker assembly. I asked Century Electric Company, a motor manufacturer, whether they could build such a motor. Well, they could. However, more importantly, Fred Pillsbury, President of Century Electric, was an avid organ buff. When Mr. Pillsbury learned about our project, he quickly became personally involved. He later became a stockholder in Allen Organ Company; and, until his death in 1988, he was an Allen director. His continuing support and philanthropic activities in the church organ field were deeply appreciated by all of us in the organ community.
In 1953, St. Catharine of Siena Roman Catholic Church, in Allentown, bought their second Allen Organ for use in their new cathedral, which was built next to the original church. In the same year Allen Organ introduced the S-12. The low-priced S-12 model sold for $1666; it not only attracted substantial attention in the marketplace but many individuals were buying S-12s for their homes. This was Allen's first foray into the home market as distinguished from the institutional market, our traditional forte. As a result, many new dealers were added; and, by the end of the year, Allen Organ Company was a very busy place.
By 1954, we again ran out of space and decided to add 10,000 square feet to the factory. At the same time, our employment increased to 130. The pent-up demand caused by the War was being released; sales increased accordingly. People were on the move building new communities and new churches. Confidence in the future was high. New models included the successful C-2—an instrument that offered a "large organ tone" and was completely self-contained.
The "Organette" appeared in 1955. This was a spinet organ for the home market. The Organette evolved over the following years as we responded to the desires of the market. We even decorated some of these models with rather elaborate hand-painted designs which were very much in vogue at that time.
Perhaps we were a little bit ahead of our time in the use of innovative marketing tools. We came up with an automatic organ demonstrator called "AREOS," which stands for "Allen's Robot Electronic Organ Salesman." The demonstration organ "played" organ music all by itself while a recording of a salesman extolled the virtues of the instrument to people curious enough to listen. When I see similar kinds of sales tools being used today, I wonder whether we retired AREOS too soon.
Also, in 1955, we were talking about having the world's largest electronic organ for demonstrations at the factory. This behemoth was equipped with 32 foot stops, a rare luxury in those days. Only the largest pipe organs had 32 foot pipes because of their immense size. Our electronic version was much smaller. I recall feeling self-satisfaction when we received an order for an Allen electronic 32 foot organ to augment the pipe organ going into the Lehigh University Chapel in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.
In that same year, our Sales Manager, Robert Pearce, appeared on a popular television show, Bob Considine's "Cavalcade of Progress." It featured a tour of the factory and a description of our products. Toward the end of the year, 200 employees and guests attended the Allen Fall Festival. In addition, the new Allen logo appeared nationwide in an advertisement in Life magazine's special issue on religion.
In October, 1956, our staff was augmented by Lawrence Phelps, who had already achieved a substantial reputation within the pipe organ industry as a designer and student of the pipe organ. Mr. Phelps had a tremendous insight into the nature of sound as produced by pipe organs and was able to provide valuable inputs during his tenure at Allen Organ Company. Regretfully, in October, 1957, he decided to pursue his career elsewhere. (He was to return to our employ in 1982). I suspected that he was unsatisfied with the best sounds we could produce at that time. However, he never specifically indicated this. Following his departure and sensing his dissatisfaction, as well as my own, I began to zero in on possible characteristics of pipe organs which might be missing from the instruments that we were producing at that time.
By 1956, our cabinet shop had its own building—a 31,000 square foot extension of the main plant. The introduction of a special exhaust system took care of most of the sawdust more efficiently. Our purchase of twelve more adjoining acres indicated the success and optimism we were enjoying. The Company's first sales seminar was held the last week in January of that year; participants heard me proclaim that, technologically, Allen intended to stay ten years ahead of others in the electronic organ field.
Later that year, an Allen Organ was used at the American Guild of Organists' convention with a special event held in the Lewisohn Stadium in New York City. Of course, installing a "real" pipe organ inside the stadium just to entertain this stronghold of "purists" was out of the question. They had to "settle" for the next best thing, an Allen. Much to my great satisfaction, the organ received excellent reviews.
Further, the prestigious Philadelphia Orchestra discovered the effectiveness of an Allen Organ in 1957. The Orchestra used an Allen Organ in a special performance at the Academy of Music that year. We later received a letter from Eugene Ormandy praising "this wonderful instrument." A continent away, a technical article written by me appeared in the British journal, Electronic Engineering. This all helped our own prestige.
We were on the move—sales in 1958 were up over 1957 despite a recession, and 12,000 more square feet were added to the factory. Church installations continued to be the mainstay of our business, but we were also acquiring a few fans from other arenas. For example, Jackie Gleason had a rather large, unusual, round house built near Peekskill, New York. An Allen Organette was incorporated into Gleason's custom-built office directly behind his chair so that he could instantly try out his musical inspirations just by turning around and playing.
In a different musical circle, conductor Leopold Stokowski commissioned Allen to design and build a new instrument for his orchestra, the Houston Symphony. He believed that orchestras were fundamentally weak in the bass and wanted an instrument of two-and-one-half octaves, with a small keyboard, which would play the same tones as the double basses but with much more power at the very low frequencies. "I believe that in time it would be an important instrument in every orchestra in the world," Stokowski wrote, "but of course at first it would receive the usual resistance to new ideas." To date he was wrong about the first part of his prediction. His Allen bass is still one of a kind.
Following up on a promise I made to our dealers three years earlier about staying ten years ahead technologically, Allen Organ Company went "solid-state" in 1959; we announced that the Company would no longer build vacuum tube generators. Instead, after three years of development, the new tone generators would be completely transistorized. Many of our competitors were caught off guard, so we enjoyed a technological edge for a while. Overall, the Company continued to build respect—financially, technically, and in customer satisfaction. In the Allen Organews that year, the question was raised, "What organist of renown will be willing to play an electronic organ, even if it is the finest in its field?" This alludes to an issue of great importance even to this day, the "purist's" attitude toward non-pipe organs and the influence this has on the organ community in general. I'll have more to say on this subject later.
In 1959, the Organews addressed the above question by citing several upcoming recitals to be performed on Allen installations by internationally famous organists. The organists mentioned were David Craighead, Organ Department Chairman of the Eastman School, Rochester, New York; Pierre Cochereau, world-famous organist of the Cathedral of Notre Dame, Paris, France; and, of course, Virgil Fox, organist of the Riverside Church of New York City.
Also in 1959, the Company established a retirement trust for salaried employees. Sales for 1959 were 10% ahead of 1958 with a large backlog at the end of the year.
In 1960, a record number (143) attended our now-established annual sales seminar. The electronic harpsichord was introduced, and the solid-state tone generators were a solid success. The fourth major expansion to the Macungie factory was begun—30,000 additional square feet were added to house the Final Test area. This is the addition upon which was erected the mammoth "Allen Organs" logo, which still unfailingly catches the eyes of visitors as they approach the factory. An Allen C-1 found its way to Kwassui Junior College, Nagasaki, Japan. And, according to the records, in 1960 an Allen TC-1 accompanied a 3300-voice choir at the Festival of Music in Princeton, New Jersey.
Another good year occurred in 1961. We had about 75 dealers on board by then and the solid-state Allen Organs were selling well. Lawrence Welk ordered an Allen electronic harpsichord which was subsequently used on his popular TV program. Around the same time, we tried to branch out a bit by offering custom stereo units, but had little success in that particular area.
By this time, I had spent countless hours listening to organ pipes in order to understand the subtle differences between the sound coming from an organ pipe and the sound coming from my electronic tone generator. I became convinced that one important element missing from my electronic tone generator was what I came to call "random motion." I had never seen anything specifically describing this phenomenon in print. However, it was clear to me that organ pipes and, in fact, all other acoustic instruments exhibit minute, yet continuous, random variations in pitch and intensity. In contrast, my electronic tone generator, at that point, exhibited a very steady, static sound. Of course, the Gyrophonic Projector helped provide some of the missing motion to the sound of the electronic tone generator. However, the Gyrophonic Projector produced a steady, repetitive undulation in the pitch and intensity of the sound suggesting a vibrato or tremolo effect.
The random motion I sought had a much different character—a kind of nervous unsteadiness. I finally was able to produce the sound I was after by powering the tone generators from a special power supply which created a randomly-varying voltage output. Use of this power supply in conjunction with a new circuit arrangement greatly improved our sound; the technique was patented. "Electronic Whind," a term coined by Robert Pearce to describe the effect, became an important feature of the Allen Organ. Our customers liked the natural sound of "Electronic Whind." But some of our competitors tried to minimize the development. One said that they were "not interested in imitating the defects of the pipe organ." Another tried to frighten customers with rumors about Allen's "unstable power supplies." Eventually, however, many of these competitors began offering their own versions of "Electronic Whind."
As an indicator of our progress to that point in time, I note that, in 1961, the Allen Organ Company became a public corporation; on November 1 of that year the first offering of stock was made available to the general public. Almost overnight, Allen Organ Company was owned not merely by the original investors and management but also by approximately 500 additional investors.