Sure enough, and in more than one catalog. Good eye.

That doesn't derail things at all! It just makes it that much easier to identify and explain how a 1963 Super Classic kit with a 14 X 14 (with matching numbers and dates) can be legit and not just a customer's special order! To this day, however, I have seen a few '63 Super Classics, but I have never seen one configured with a 14 X 14. I wonder why they put that option in extra-small print and in that position in the ad, though. Short of sales receipts, the catalogs are really the only available reference material we have.

I have plenty of experience as a manufacturer's representative. For several years during more than thirty years in that profession, catalogs were very helpful for consumers as "wish books". How many of us slept with drum catalogs under our pillows or next to our beds? The catalogs also served as a reference to retailers of a brand's products. A large majority of my dealers would point to a page and say that they wanted to order that particular drum set...let's say Londoner V...in such and such color. A lot of those dealers had little imagination, so they would say to order it in the color shown in the catalog. "Oh yeah...Also send me one in red". Some of the dealers would say to order a drum set pictured on a catalog page but change the color and sizes of the drum(s) or add or subtract certain hardware on the drums. Then, there were other dealers who would design the drum sets they ordered for the store of for consumers by piecing the set together from the catalog pages. I bought most of my drum sets (many of them--mostly Slingerland) from this last type of dealer. Sometimes, the store had a set on display that did not appear in a catalog, but it suited my tastes very well. Other times, I worked with the dealer to configure a new drum set exactly as I wanted it to be configured--Rogers and Camco. I never once gave a thought to what number or name designation was assigned to my drum set other than my own name. I won't criticize the catalog-correct obsession that some of my fellow drummers have. But, I am often amused by the arguing that goes on between them. I get the most amusement from the guitar side of the profession I worked at for all those years. "Leo Fender NEVER made that model of guitar in that color", says one self-anointed expert". "Some of my fellow employees, who had worked with the great Leo Fender, said that back in that year, Leo would let the salesmen custom order colors for their dealers. So, that 1959 left-handed Telecaster in Olive Green could be 100% original", was a typical response from me. We went through a period of a few years when the individual reps would design a guitar that was unique for our own territories. These were no the very expensive Custom Sho guitars, They were variations of the Standard American-made guitars at a slightly higher price. There were several models of "Texas Special" instruments that were available only to Texas-based authorized fender dealers. The factory designers told me about a new pickup they were making for Stevie Ray Vaughan that they were calling the Texas Special pickups. We spec'd them to be in a Texas Special Sratocaster with a companion Texas Specal model pickup for a Tele. Of course, I chose unique guitar finishes. This is kinda like what a few drum shops such as Steve Maxwell are doing with Gretsch drums.

Yep....All that was well and good back in those days -the old days. But, now, because of all the drummers who ordered their kits in the manner that you described, the present-day vintage drum collectors (some of us) are challenged to avoid those kits in favor of the kits that are more closely matched to the ones listed in the old catalogs. It doesn't make any of those other kits "bad". But, it does often affect the values to collectors.

In fact, I have to thank all of the people who ordered those custom size kits for themselves, because it makes the catalog configurations that much more desirable, now!

If a vintage drum collector had the choice of getting a completely matched, catalog-correct, reference-able, vintage drum kit and the choice of getting a "custom-ordered" configuration made up by some unknown, non-entity drummer back in the day, then I'm confident which one most (if not all) vintage drum collectors would pay a higher price to get.

Lots of us custom-ordered our own kits back in the days when they were not vintage or collectable. They were just commonly-available musical tools. The only bearing that has, today, is that a catalog kit is harder to find amongst all the custom-ordered and/or pieced-together kits. The difficulty in finding a matched, catalog kit, today, makes them more desirable -simple as that. :)

I can only speak for Rogers Drums with any authority. Some of those drum sets that were given names and shown in the catalogs existed only for those pictures. That's especially true for the sets with the most drums in them. Of course, if someone wanted to order one of those drum sets, we would accommodate the person who wanted it. Some of the configurations in the catalogs were concocted by the marketing people to show some possibilities of what a drummer could do with all of the various drum sizes, hardware, and assorted doodads that we offered.

Responding to the very informative post by O lugs about the collecting habits of the catalog-correct people. I'm very grateful for people like him who drive up the prices for catalog-listed vintage drums. They make a custom-ordered drum set configuration much more affordable for the rest of us.

^^^Touche'! I have no problem with that! :)

I'm really enjoying everyone's take on this subject! O-Lugs and leedybdp... very informative information!

-Mark

Yes, what those marketing people had to do was to make up some slick photos to show off the drums. And they did such a great job of it, many of us still remember those catalogs and we remember looking at those pictures and admiring those exact kits in the pictures.

So, now, we fast forward to the time when we are able to actually get what we once could only fantasize about...

...And here we are! Present-day! Ta-DAH!! Party

Now I have some money and I can start a collecting hobby...I'm looking for those old catalog kits and when I find one that checks all the boxes, then that's what I want. It's got a lot to do with the nostalgia for those old catalog kits. I might only want to find one to set up in my den and look at....Even if it has bad (but original) bearing edges, I might not care about that.

For me, to get a matched kit in great shape with a name that some goofy marketing person came up with back in the old days for whatever reason, is what it's all about to my collecting style. And, apparently, I'm not the only one who feels this way...not that it matters, but just sayin'

I wish you well with your type of collecting. I have approached the hobby from the perspective of wanting the types of drum sets that I owned or wanted to own back in the 1950s and 1960s. Those drum sets were usually not pictured in their exact configurations in the catalogs. There is plenty of room for both of us in the hobby.