Hi,

Here’s another one that just came in. I got this off of Ebay from Steve Hillman, a collector on the East Coast. I don’t own one of these so it was a nice addition to the engraved snare drum section of my collection. This is most likely near the end of the engraved snare drum era from the Leedy Drum Company.

1939-41 LEEDY 6.5 x 14 BROADWAY STANDARD “T-BIRD” ENGRAVED ELITE MODEL

This drum came to me in excellent condition so very little cleaning was needed.

All that was needed was top and bottom of-the-era calf heads and a set of Leedy (logo) wires.

This was an easy one but I do have a restoration tip to pass along. This is purely personal but maybe a few restorers out there will find this useful. If you notice on all of my restorations you will see “aged” snare cord. I think that it looks out of place to have brand new white snare cord on an 85 year old drum; functionally it’s no problem, visually it drives me nuts. Here are two tips for you... 1. I use Yamaha snare cord model SNC-10 but before installing the snares I run the cords through a used (blackened) piece of Cape Cod Polishing Cloth, this darkens (antiques) the white cord and in my opinion makes it more realistic looking... 2. I just discovered Puresound makes model MS4 (dark brown brained line). This is what I used on the drum in this article.

I am very happy with this product. I hope this helps.

Philly Joe Jones was once asked in an interview: Q: What’s your favorite drumset? A: The one that I don’t have to set up.

If I may paraphrase to suit my situation: Q: What’s your favorite vintage snare drum? A: The one that I don’t have to restore!

Enjoy!

Mike Curotto