Parlor
Victorians had this notion that you didn’t talk about being wealthy: You let your surroundings speak for you. This Parlor says a great deal. Filled with art from ceiling to floor, the Parlor was meant to impress. It is a female space and Cremora’s domain.
The Parlor was a formal space that was used exclusively for entertaining guests. The Rogers family would not have relaxed in this room. In a very real sense, Henry and Cremora would spend the most amount of money in this room but the least amount of time.
It was also place to demonstrate a families taste, culture, social graces, and status. Cremora might entertain callers with an afternoon tea or with an evening filled with music.
In this room there are:
- Kranich and Bach square grand piano built in 1875. Square grands offered the sound of a concert grand but in a very small footprint. They were common until the beginnings of the 20th century.
- Stella music box. The music is recorded on steel disks. These disks, with their holes and spaces, are actually an early form of digital music and one of the first computer progams, predating the player piano. To lower the volume, a user would "Put a Lid on It" and the phrase was born.
- Melodeon. The Melodeon is a type of pump organ. It is an American development of the harmonium, from which it differs in two principal respects. Its foot-operated bellows draw the air in past the reeds by suction, rather than forcing it out by pressure; and the characteristic size and form of the reeds and resonators result in a more dynamic and organ-like tone. The photo on the wall is a father who was teaching his 16-year-old daughter how to play this actual instrument in 1870.
