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AIRBRUSH HISTORY | ||
The Inventors - Abner Peeler & Liberty Walkup | ||
The
fathers of the oscillating needle airbrush. They wern't the first to use
air to spray with but they did create a unique airbrush that lives on in
the famous Paasche "AB." These two are forever tied together in airbrush
history for neither would have gotten nearly as far without the other.
Peeler was the inventor, Walkup was the promoter; it was Edison meets
P.T. Barnum. The article below is from a 1929 Nebraska newspaper and documents peelers airbrush and it's story. Click on it to see the whole article; it opens in a new window. (
Courtesy Charmayne Bischel's genealogy site)
The
story begins in Iowa in 1879 when Abner Peeler through together
some odds and ends with a small vaned wheel (it resembles a tiny
pinwheel) and the “paint distributer” was born. “Paint
distributer?” - the name alone tells you he wasn’t exactly a Enter
the flamboyant one time Bible salesman, Liberty Walkup and his older
brother Charles, the silent moneyman. In 1881 they buy the rights to
Peeler's invention and become assignees(owners) on the first airbrush
patent. Peeler got $700 and an additional $150 for further improvements,
most notably, the "walking bar(arm)." In the original
airbrush, the needle was mounted directly to the "wind-wheel"
and this limited the reciprocating movement of the needle. The only way
to get more movement was to mount the needle toward the edge of the
wheel. Since the distance of the needle from the center of the wheel is
greater, it is mirrored at the other end of the needle. The needle tip
now moves in a circular pattern under the air blast tube causing a
sporadic pattern. To solve this problem, Peeler comes up with the
"walking bar." It's a thin idler bar anchored at In March of 1883, with a $50,000 in common stock sales, the Walkups form "The Rockford Manufacturing Co." to produce the new "Air Brush." Within 6 months the name is changed to "The Airbrush Manufacturing Company." Barely
a week before he gets the patent on his first airbrush, Walkup
files one for an improved model and it's granted on May 6, In
January, 1885, Walkup is granted a patent for an upgraded airbrush with
two main improvements. First, the mechanism that pinches the rubber
tubing to regulate the air flow at the rear is simplified and moved
inside body. Second, the air blast tube can now be adjusted so as to
maintain proper alignment with the needle. From
the outset Walkup, along with his wife Phoebe, a photo retoucher,
tirelessly promote his airbrush. Their first demonstration was at the
1882 Photographic Convention in Indianapolis. He was awarded silver and
gold medals at Philadelphia's Franklin Institute exhibitions in 1884 and
1886. The airbrush is exhibited at the 1884 World Exposition in New
Orleans. They traveled often to Chicago, the center of the thriving
photo retouching industry. Color photography was decades away and if you
wanted a color portrait, as everyone did, a black and white photograph
had to be hand colored. It was a tedious, time consuming, and labor
intensive art. It was done assembly line style with one person, a
"spot knocker," specializing on a single portion
Things were looking good for Liberty but the future wouldn't be kind.
The airbrush was about to radically change and the manufacturing center
was about to move some 80 miles southeastward to Chicago. New
names-Burdick, Thayer & Chandler, Wold, Paasche were about to steal
his thunder. Walkup patents an airbrush in 1905 but it is way too little
and way to late to turn his fortunes. Liberty Walup died in 1927 and was
buried in Mt. Morris, Illinois. |
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AIRBRUSH HISTORY PRESENTED BY THE AIRBRUSH MUSEUM FEATURING A TIMELINE, PHOTOS, AND PATENT DRAWINGS.