Dave “Dave’s Picks” Polaschek reminded me via email that today, January 13th, is the anniversary of Anthony Faas’ filing of a first U.S. patent — number 11062 — for accordions, or more accurately, “certain new and useful Improvements in Accordions”.
(The oldest patent for the accordion belongs to Cyrill Demian from Vienna; that one is dated May 1829. I’ll celebrate that day later this year.)
Pictured below are Anthony Faas and the result of his work, approximately 150 years later…
From Faas to Kick Aass! Left: Anthony Faas of Philadelphia, US patent holder for “certain new and useful Improvements in Accordions”. Right: Yours truly rockin’ out at Kick Ass Karaoke. That’s Jeff Kahl holding the mic.
The US Patent site seems to mangle the images of Faas’ patent, so I’ve posted them in an Accordion Patent photo album, which you can view in either album or slideshow format.
I recommend that you celebrate this day with some accordion music. If you don’t have any, give The Decemberists’ The Mariner’s Revenge Song [6.0MB, MP3], one of the big indie rock songs of 2005, a listen.
3 replies on “It’s Accordion Patent Day!”
Love the hat.
Especially nice in this entry
Have you ever stopped to LOOK at the date on the photo above– it clearly says JUNE 13, not January!! Apparently someone jotted down “Jun” and they or another misread it as “Jan”. Result – you are all observing the WRONG DAY!!
Oh, and here’s another blogger who noticed the mistake, apparently from looking at your graphic above (since he, in fact, links to it to make his point).
[…] Many sites claim that today (January 13) is the anniversary of the day the first U.S. patent for an accordion was granted to Anthony Faas in 1854. A quick look at Faas’ original patent, however, reveals that it was filed on April 7 and granted on JUNE 13 (not January 13). I’m guessing that, somewhere along the line, someone mistook “Jun” for “Jan” and the mistake was unwittingly perpetuated. Let it stop here once and for all! […]
My brother and I were both accordian players and still have our faithful Excelsior accordians!