More pictures!

Didn't Ludwig Purchase their name back in 1955? If so the '57 drum in question may have been an older shell they had in stock used with a P83 strainer which I believe was available by 1959 or perhaps 1958.

I have an jazz festival from around 1962/1963 which I got from Bun E. Carlos. He indicates its a '63 but I think its an older shell because the interior is unpainted with a pre-serial badge. There is no interior date stamp. It has a P83 strainer, round muffler AND my copy is 5.5 inches although as you point out the Jazz Festival was intended to have a 5" inch shell. I believe the early Jazz Fests sometimes were built with 5.5 inch shells if that was what they had in stock. As we all know Ludwig didn't waste anything. Speed King bass drum pedals with the WFL logo were still being sold long after they reverted to the Ludwig name.

I opined it was a 1963 snare drum. With a round muffler knob I'm probably off by a year or two......oops!

I've 2 JF's : 5.25 DEPTH = 1964 (no date stamp); 5.5" = MAY 8 1964. Seems 5" was what they aimed for and often missed; just like a lot of the components that make up vintage Ludwig drums.

No oops required. I'm not certain of the year either. I'm basing it on research here and elsewhere. My son, Milestones on this site, actually bought it from you, but since he lives with me what's his is mine. :) D' Drummer

By '63 I believe the interiors of new shells we're all white. As you know the WMP shell interior was not painted.. You had so many Jazz Fests up for saie. Don't know if you knew your WMP model had a 5.5" shell rather than the 5" shell that Ludwig specified. That actually works better for my son since he's using it with a 13/16/22 Super Classic WMP set from around 1961/62. For all intents, other than the P83 throw off, the 5.5 inch shell is identical to a Super Classic snare I believe. And the modest amount of aging discoloration of the wrap is a spot on match to the other drums!

As has been discussed often, Ludwig used what they had in stock and wasted nothing. I'm also sure many WFL stamped components ended up being used for years after the Ludwig name was purchased back from Conn. That might have been more difficult if Ludwig had been using a completely different trade name and logo rather than his initials in a keystone..

They did buy their name back in 1955 but they didn't change their drum brand to "Ludwig" until the advent of the new "Transition" badge sometime in 1958. The WFL badges went through a transition as well with the company name at the bottom being changed to "Ludwig Drum Co" sometime in 1956 or 57. So, while they changed the company name almost immediately after the purchase the drums themselves continued to be branded as WFL for approx. 3 more years. Die cast items continued to carry the WFL logo until the dies were worn out and had to be replaced so they continued making WFL branded snare stands well into the 60's (maybe even the 70's) and of course they used other parts with WFL on them until they were gone. I think it's safe to assume that the occasional WFL snare butt was still surfacing well into the early 60's if it were hiding at the bottom of a parts bin.

So my gold-on-black Duco snare must be earlier than I had thought.

WFL-in-a-keystone everything, P-83 strainer, and COB hoops. No date stamp, no serial.

More likely closer to '55 than '59?

I believe the p83 strainer was introduced in 1958 or 1959. but that doesn't mean that the shell wasn't older.

Some additional information. Rob Cook (The Ludwig Book p204) has the WFL P83 strainer as 1953-1958. The mechanism of this one is visibly different from the later ones. There is a bit of the mechanism which sticks out. This is from the 1957 catalog (with my annotation on the mechanism):

[img]http://black.net.nz/drums/barrett-deems.png[/img]

The later P83 has Ludwig on the lower portion as well as the different mechanism where that part didn't stick out. Rob Cook gives the dates for those as 1959 onwards.

What we don't have data on is how many of the older mechanism (tab sticking out) ones are paired with the Ludwig bottom, and how many of the later mechanism ones (no tab sticking out) have the WFL bottom. The changeover doesn't need to have happened instantly, and the WFL bottom and Ludwig bottom are interchangeable (as far as I can tell) so either in the factory or post factory people can play mix and match.

So...which P83 has yours got? Does the tab stick out? And if you have a WFL badge, what does it say? There is a difference (as KO mentioned) between these two WFL badges from 1948-52

WFL

DRUM CO.

1728 N Damen Ave

CHICAGO U.S.A.

versus ones from 1955-59

WFL

DRUMS

Ludwig Drum Co.

CHICAGO U.S.A.

and there may be at least two different badges in the 1955-1959 period. See p175 in the Rob Cook book where he has two badges (one labelled "WFL Brass keystone, silkscreened Brown paint"). For that particular brown silkscreened badge I've recorded one with a date stamp of December 6, 1956. Cook shows a badge next to this he simply calls "WFL Brass keystone" but he doesn't give specific years for either badge. Contrast this with the reference hung off VDF:

http://www.vintagedrumguide.com/ludwig_badges.html

which has the years I've given above but just two 1950s WFL badges. I don't know why there is a gap of a few years between those two, and I don't know how many examples the years are based on. And I'm not sure if there are really two distinct WFL DRUMS badges (silkscreened brown paint versus not silkscreened brown paint) although it certainly looks like it from Cook's book.

So please have a look and tell us which sort of badge you have on your snare. It might help.