When I was dating Ryan, his family had a piano in their basement that they let me play on. When we got engaged, his parents told us that we could have it. I was ecstatic. I knew I would go crazy insane if I didn't have one to play on the rest of my life. Playing the piano is my therapy....Even though I was thrilled, I had no idea about the history behind this gem of mine. This past weekend, my son, Devon, got ordained to be a teacher in the Aaronic Priesthood, and Grandpa Henrie came down to share the moment with us and stand in the circle. Later Sunday evening I asked him to tell me all the details of our piano, and here they are. I LOVE that it is old and that it has such a rich history and been in the homes of so many Henries!
From what a piano tuner once looked up for me, the piano was built in the 1890s. The piano's first home was in the Blue Pine Hotel in Panguitch, Utah, owned by Ryan's great, great grandmother, Mary Crosby. It was the first hotel in Panguitch. (As a cool side note, Butch Cassidy's mother was a maid there, and Butch used to sneak in there to visit her once in a while). Mary was a widow, and when she sold the hotel, she took the piano out and gave it to her youngest daughter, Beulah Crosby Allen. Beulah taught piano lessons on it. It was an old player piano, originally 2 feet taller than it is now. Eventually Beulah gave it to her daughter, Cleo Henrie (Ryan's grandmother) when her daughters, Marie and Cleola, were teenagers and thought they might want to learn how to play it. It originally had ebony and ivory keys, but one day a gentleman came through Panguitch and offered to replace the whole keyboard with plastic (I think) keys if he could keep the ebony and ivory that had worn down in parts, so Cleo agreed. When Ryan's Dad got married, his father-in-law, David Braithwaite, was a talented carpenter and specialized in cutting down old player pianos and refinishing them, so he cut the piano down, took out the player parts, and refinished it. It then went back to Panguitch until Ryan's family moved to Grantsville. At that time, Cleo gave it to Ryan's parents so that if any of their children wanted to learn to play the piano they would have the opportunity. It was stored in a granary for a year in Grantsville, and then later was moved to American Fork. When they moved to Provo and Ryan's Dad got hired at BYU, it was then stored in a garage outside their Provo home for several years until it made its way down into their basement. That is where it was when I met Ryan. It has moved with Ryan and I eight times now, to three homes in Provo, one in Springville, one in Driggs, Idaho, and three homes in Cedar City. When we pulled up to our rental home in Driggs, Ryan saw all of the steps up to the front porch and said there was no way we could get the piano in there. The piano weight wise is a beast, but I told him we weren't going to get rid of it and that I would find a way. We drove up the road and passed a house, and I told him to stop and that I was going to go knock on the door of this stranger's house and see if there was anyone that lived there that could help us. Ryan thought I was crazy. I knocked on the door, and it turned out to be the home of the bishop of the ward, Larell Kunz. He kindly called some more men and they hauled the piano in the house :). (Another side note, Larell and Deanne Kunz are still some of our dearest friends to this day, We are SO glad we met them there!!)
Truly it is my "grand piano"! I honestly don't know what I'd do without it. It is one of my most treasured worldly possessions, and I think I'll bawl or be royally ticked off if there are no pianos in heaven or hell, wherever I end up!
I hope it stays in our family for generations to come and that they will appreciate the generations of hands that have touched its keys. Last summer, Ryan and his Dad so kindly refinished it in a rustic black for me. (Devon had carved his name and all sorts of other lovely artwork into it with a nail when we lived in Driggs.) Here is my baby:
