(Excerpt from The History of the Player So, if this work...)
Excerpt from The History of the Player So, if this work is not up to standard pitch, if it does not compare with my previous writings, if it is wanting in literary style, and is deficient in other respects, too numerous to mention, then let the read er take into consideration my physical condition, my age and environment. In a work of such lim ited proportions it was impossible to refer to all those who have been instrumental in the subsequent improvement and development of the player, after it passed from my hands, and such improvements have been many and important, but coincident with the printing of the last chapter of the present work I will begin the publication of the technical historyof the player which will appear first in serial order in the Musical Courier Extra and subsequently in book form. In writing the technical history of the player I will take up each patent both foreign and domestic in regular chronological order, pointing out exactly what the claims of each patent cover and the amount of credit due each inventor in connection with the player. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
https://www.amazon.com/History-Player-Classic-Reprint/dp/0266740197?SubscriptionId=AKIAJRRWTH346WSPOAFQ&tag=prabook-20&linkCode=sp1&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=0266740197
John McTammany was born on June 26, 1845 in Kelvin Row, a suburb of Glasgow, Scotland, of poor parents, John and Agnes (McLean) McTammany. His father emigrated to America, leaving his two infant sons in the care of their mother, who had to work out, and their grandmother.
John enjoyed a few months at school but was soon obliged to help support the family.
McTammany's ambition was to become a great pianist when he grew up, but fate decided otherwise. There was not an industry on the Clyde, from rope-and chain-making to ship-building, with which he did not become familiar, and by his work, the muscles of his hands permanently lost their pliancy. In 1862, the elder McTammany was able to send for his family. They settled in Uniontown, Ohio, and John, a born inventor, turned his attention to improvements in harvester machinery.
According to his own statement he enlisted in 1863 in the 115th Ohio Volunteer Infantry. He was more than once wounded, critically during the fighting around Chattanooga. During his convalescence, at Nashville, while visiting a pawnshop where musical instruments were kept, he volunteered to repair a music box. While thus engaged, the idea of a new musical instrument, to be operated by depressions instead of pins and staples, occurred to him.
Returning to Uniontown, in 1865, he taught music, played in the band, and sold pianos and organs during the day, while he experimented with his piano at night. Within a year he practically mastered his invention. During the next ten years he built, successively, three models of his player and two machines to prepare the perforated sheets.
In St. Louis, in the winter of 1876, he gave a public exhibition of his largest model, fitted to an Estey organ. Up to that time no instrument had ever been constructed embodying the essential and necessary elements of his invention, such as a flexible sheet on rolls, wind motor, foot pedals, and other important features, suitable for pianos as well as organs. There had been keyboard attachments and other propositions, but even the most pretentious one, of French origin, soon became obsolete. The musical profession strongly opposed McTammany's innovation from the start.
Manufacturers to whom he confided his plans shook their heads but copied his blueprints. In the fall of 1876, considering his invention completed, he had filed a caveat fully describing it. This application gave him two years in which to take out a basic patent. Unfortunately, two years found him in worse difficulties; he let the time in which to obtain his patent go by, and it was declared public property. In due time the manufacturers felt at liberty to apply for and obtain patents.
McTammany finally landed in a garret on Tremont Street, Boston, and there, on credit desperately obtained, he built a small instrument embodying his invention, which he named the Organette. After finishing two of these miniature players, which had a special scale of sixteen notes, the inventor tried unsuccessfully to sell them to the music trade. Finally he found buyers for his player and in time he became successful. Then came a long and costly litigation which once more reduced him to poverty.
The patentees of the player stopped him from manufacturing his instrument, but in 1880 he was declared to be the original and prior inventor. Finding themselves defeated in the courts, his competitors, after he had obtained capital to manufacture his player on a large scale, acquired a majority of his company's stock and ousted him.
On September 13, 1892, McTammany received a basic patent for a pneumatic registering ballot box, employing the perforated roll. It was the first machine ever used in an election and was adopted in a number of states, but again McTammany was unable to overcome competition. At last the inventor, although of large, robust build, broke down completely and died on March 26, 1915, in the military hospital at Stamford, Connecticut. The city accorded him a public funeral, at which all the music was played on a grand player-piano.
His remains were two years later removed from Stamford, to Canton, Ohio, where elaborate Memorial Day exercises in his honor were held, May 30, 1917, in Westlawn Cemetery, and where the final interment took place near the McKinley monument.
Still interested in pursuing piano venues, McTammany succeeded in producing the first roller paper player piano player in 1876. In 1881, he received the patent for his invention which went into manufacture and successful production distribution world wide. He also created a voting machine with a similar paper punch device as the paper roll on the player piano with a punch-card for voting machines, which are still used widely today.
(Excerpt from The History of the Player So, if this work...)
There is no any information about his personal life.
