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The main factory building was shaped in the form of a large letter "L".
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They had a three-story factory built on Twelfth Street and the Grand Trunk Railway in downtown Detroit. H Flinn, vice president, Farrand was treasurer and Votey was the company's secretary. In 1887, the company's officers were W.F. The company was then renamed the Farrand & Votey Organ Company from Whitney Organ Company. Whitney retired in 1887 selling his interest in the company to Votey and Farrand. The company hired dozens of employees and manufactured reed organs. Farrand joined this new company a few months after it was formed and became its financial manager as the secretary-treasurer. Whitney became the general manager, and Votey was its mechanical engineer in charge of designing organs. Whitney and Votey bought out the failed company and in 1883 organized as the Whitney Organ Company. The origin of the Farrand & Votey Organ Company dates back to 1881 when the employee owned Detroit Reed Organ Company was dissolved. The company dissolved in 1897 and split up into two separate companies of the owners, each making their own style of organs. In 1897 it built the nation's largest pipe organ. In 1893 it built a huge organ for the Chicago World's Fair, where it was played in recitals by world-renowned organists. In 1891 the company built a monumental 2,700 pipe organ for the Detroit's First Presbyterian Church. The company made huge organs on special order contracts. The Farrand & Votey Organ Company produced 7,200 instruments a year by 1889. The company is the development of the old Detroit Reed Organ Company that was originally bought out in 1881. Votey, hence the name of Farrand & Votey. Farrand & Votey Organ Company, circa 1890įarrand & Votey Organ Company was a nineteenth-century manufacturer of pianos, reed and pipe organs, and player pianos located in Detroit, Michigan.