The tools of M. Deo Kirk's piano tuning trade

This array of tools was in transit yesterday at the Lucas County Historical Society Museum while I rearranged one the Vredenburg Gallery's music-related displays --- trying to add some context and coherence.

The tools, which form a piano-tuner's kit, came to the museum in 1984 upon the death of M. Deo Kirk (left), who died on January 1 of that year, two months short of his 91st birthday. Deo, who was blind, had supported himself as a piano repairman and tuner for more than 50 years until semi-retiring in the mid-1960s.

Deo was born during 1893 in Derby, one of 11 children of Elisha A. and Sarah Elizabeth Kirk. His father, variously described as a wheelwright and mechanic, operated a general repair shop in Derby well into the 1930s. Newspaper reports note that Deo was "almost blind" as a small child, but provide no information about the circumstances.

Whatever the cause, he was enrolled by his parents during 1901 at age 8 in the Iowa School for the Blind at Vinton where he remained a student, returning home to Derby for summers, until graduation in 1913, aged 20.

A course in piano tuning and repair had been introduced at the Vinton school --- for some reason for male students only --- during the late 19th century and Deo took advantage of it. Some of the tools in his kit reportedly were acquired when he was a student and remained in use all of his working life.

Deo returned to Lucas County upon graduation to practice his trade and in the process became one of its most widely known residents, commonly identified as you might expect as the "blind piano tuner."

During those years, he boarded in Chariton but considered Derby his permanent home until after his parents died. After that, he moved into the Hotel Charitone, where he lived for more than 30 years.

Although Deo never married, he was very sociable and traveled frequently. He also outlived all of his siblings and so was survived only by nieces, nephews and friends when he died.