- Steinway & Sons workers are on the week on / week off schedule (with the exception of the five weeks during the summer when the factory is closed completely). The company is in crisis, notwithstanding the American economic boom of the fifties, simply because there’s no wide demand for pianos, and certainly not for such high-end, expensive instruments as those made by Steinway & Sons.
- After six years of working in Steinway & Sons Astoria factory, Frederick Steinway becomes Roman de Majewski’s assistant in the wholesale department. He goes on the road promoting Steinway pianos.
- Steinway & Sons board of directors approves Henry Z. Steinway’s plan to consolidate the factories, allocating the budget of $673,761 for adding several new buildings to the Riker site, as well as more square footage to the existing ones, to create enough space for the lacquer, belly, string, case and upright departments, cross-cut and pre-mill storage areas, and general offices. Henry Z. Steinway puts Frank Walsh in charge of consolidating the production.
- Henry Z. Steinway also proposes to reduce the Steinway & Sons worker retirement age to 65.
- Twenty-year-old pianist Harvey Lavan “Van” Cliburn, Jr. from Kilgore, Texas, debuts with the New York Philharmonic Orchestra.