The Armstrong Piano Company was established by W. B. Armstrong NY in 1884. By the turn-of-the-century, Armstrong went into partnership with Foster & Company, forming the Foster-Armstrong Piano Company. The firm’s Rochester was destroyed by fire in 1903 after which the firm moved to nearby Dispatch, NY. (Dispatch was then incorporated as East Rochester in 1906)
Foster-Armstrong was a major force in piano manufacturing in the early 20th Century, and they built pianos under the names of Foster, Armstrong, and Foster-Armstrong. During the late 19th and early 20th Centuries, the firm built a number of higher quality pianos for a dealer by the name of James F. Cook of Lawrenceburg, Indiana, under the brand name of “J. F. Cook”. By the 1930’s era, Foster-Armstrong merged with the giant Aeolian-American Corporation, and they began building pianos for several popular piano manufacturers including Haines, Fischer, Marshall & Wendell, Franklin, Holmes & Sons, Brewster, and Stratford. Aeolian continued to build pianos under many of these names throughout the 20th Century before going out of business in the 1980’s.
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