diff --git a/apptools/persistence/state_pickler.py b/apptools/persistence/state_pickler.py
index ce48de921..aed0bdcb2 100644
--- a/apptools/persistence/state_pickler.py
+++ b/apptools/persistence/state_pickler.py
@@ -918,18 +918,14 @@ def _do_dict(self, obj, state):
 def _get_file_read(f):
     if hasattr(f, 'read'):
         return f
-    elif isinstance(f, str):
-        return open(f, 'rb')
     else:
-        raise TypeError('Given object is neither a file or String')
+        return open(f, 'rb')
 
 def _get_file_write(f):
     if hasattr(f, 'write'):
         return f
-    elif isinstance(f, str):
-        return open(f, 'wb')
     else:
-        raise TypeError('Given object is neither a file or String')
+        return open(f, 'wb')
 
 
 ######################################################################
diff --git a/apptools/persistence/tests/test_state_pickler.py b/apptools/persistence/tests/test_state_pickler.py
index 98922a530..70bf42573 100644
--- a/apptools/persistence/tests/test_state_pickler.py
+++ b/apptools/persistence/tests/test_state_pickler.py
@@ -8,6 +8,8 @@
 import base64
 import unittest
 import math
+import os
+import tempfile
 
 import numpy
 
@@ -450,6 +452,17 @@ def __getstate__(self):
         s = state_pickler.get_state(b)
         self.assertEqual(s.a, 'dict')
 
+    def test_dump_to_file_str(self):
+        """Test if dump can take a str as file"""
+        obj = A()
+
+        filepath = os.path.join(tempfile.gettempdir(), "tmp.file")
+
+        try:
+            state_pickler.dump(obj, filepath)
+        finally:
+            os.remove(filepath)
+
 
 if __name__ == "__main__":
     unittest.main()