- William Richard Steinway, age 26, the eldest son of William Steinway Sr. by second marriage, together with Ernest Urchs, the company’s wholesale genius, sets out on a ten-week road trip through North America. Their mission is to boost Steinway & Sons’ North American sales. After the trip Ernest Urchs reports that, notwithstanding the recession, the volume of business done during the trip has surpassed that of any other year. To his great surprise, more expensive Steinway & Sons piano models sell better than the cheaper ones, buyers perceiving expensive pianos as good long-term investments.
- The tunnel under East River, envisioned and started by William Steinway in 1892, and later financed by August Belmont, Jr., finally opens. (It is nowadays known as “Steinway Tunnel”, and is carrying the 7th train from Manhattan to Queens.)
- The factory of Daimler Manufacturing Company burns to the ground. (Because of the economic recession, the factory won’t be rebuilt.)
- William Richard Steinway and his brother Theodore Edwin Steinway build a motor car, named SAJI (Societe Anonyme de Junk Shop Internationale). This vehicle will remain William R. Steinway’s primary method of transportation for the next quarter of the century, both in the United States and in Europe.
- German government imposes new tariffs on metal parts, making it more economically reasonable for Hamburg’s Steinway Pianofabrik to order piano plates from local manufacturers, rather than having them shipped from the United States. Thus, the manufacturing of Steinway Pianofabrik in Hamburg becomes independent from Steinway & Sons in New York.