Business at Hammacher Schlemmer is booming as the company stocks over 100,000 items, the largest inventory of hardware on the East Coast. Even more unusual than the diverse selection is the manner in which it is displayed - on velvet in mahogany cabinets. It is from these cabinets that Isaac Singer supposedly selected the parts to construct his first sewing machine and Alexander Calder bought wire to create his celebrated mobiles.
At 2:20 a.m. on April 15, 1912, the British ocean liner RMS Titanic sinks in the Northern Atlantic Ocean, taking with it over 1,500 victims and making it one of the deadliest peacetime maritime disasters in history.
Hammacher Schlemmer's Cabinet Makers Benches were, appropriately, crafted almost entirely of wood and considered fine examples of furniture-making in their own right. "They are not the ordinary kind made to sell in competition with the cheapest, but are made of thoroughly seasoned, kiln-dried stock, carefully and scientifically put together", states the description in our catalog.
Hammacher Schlemmer prints its largest catalog to-date. Spanning 1,112 pages and taking a total of four years to compile, the catalog confirmed Hammacher as the most complete hardware source on the East Coast. One hardbound edition remains housed in the Smithsonian's permanent collection.
