I have just purchased a player piano that has three different names on it. On the inside of the top cover is "Lester Piano Co. Factories, Lester, PA" Inside the keyboard cover is Leonard & CO., Phila. Also under the keyboard cover is F A North Co., 1306 Chestnut Ave.
The serial # of the piano is 39529. The serial # of the string component made by Leonard is 134987.
Can anyone help me with the age of this instrument?
Thank you, dave

Lester is the company that made Leonard pianos. North is probably the company that sold the piano. A Leonard serial number of 134987 would be c. 1926, 39529 c. 1904. Lester numbers would be 1941 and 1906, respectively. I would guess that the 1926 date is the most likely.

dd,

BDB is right on the money. The North company was a retail outfit and was very close to the original center city showroom for Cunningham Piano.

The Leonard players were nicely built. One of our player experts got his start with Lester many many years ago and has always had good things to say about them.

Good Luck,

We've got our share of Lesters here in Chicago. I've never seen a player, but have partially rebuilt a couple of grands. The spinets are low quality, and most have loose tuning pins now. The grands seemed less than average, but not terrible.