“Build it and they will drum.” Dedicated to research, study and comparisons of field drums. Our purpose is to collect information about historical U.S. drums (manufacture, preservation, conservancy, repair, market) for use by scholars, collectors and others. Photographs of drums, and anything related, together with informative narratives, are welcome. Interested readers will find archived postings a good resource. Reach us at emirsky@gmail.com.
Artifacts
are storytellers. They connect us - to our past, to long-gone strangers
whom we’ve never met, to each other, and even to ourselves. To study an
artifact is powerful and necessary. It is a responsibility that we have
as human beings - and as drummers and percussionists - to preserve the
stories of our craft and to preserve the names, faces, and teachings of
those who came before us. Aaron and I find inspiration in those stories,
which is part of the reason why we so enjoy taking the time to help
protect that history and discover new editions of it, no matter how
small.
This
is the story of one small artifact: a roughly 5"x7" glass negative
found (in its digital file form) in the Library of Congress Prints &
Photographs online database. It is one of about 70,000 glass and film
negatives given to the Library in 1955 by the Harris & Ewing
photography studio of Washington, D.C. When this particular negative was
digitized, Library staff gave it a simple title (“Drummers”) based on
the only information they could gather from the content of the photo
itself - that four of the five men pictured were carrying drums. There
was no accompanying title or caption and the smallest date range they
could gather was that it was taken between 1923–1929 (based on other
nearby negatives in the collection).
Immediately,
this image fascinated me. Clearly there was a reason this moment was
captured. I had to know what that reason was and why that reason didn’t
already travel with this negative. As always, discovery begins with
questions. And I had a ton of questions.
With
some logical reasoning and a little bit of research, I was able to
determine that the man receiving the award in the image was the one and
only Frank S. Fancher: renowned rudimental snare drummer, legendary
record-breaker, and all-around badass boundary pusher.
Frank
Fancher, an oft-overlooked rudimental snare drum legend, posing in his
medal-covered drum corps uniform with his drum and his trophies in the
early 1920s. The centered text reads: “Frank Fancher, “Wizard of the
Drum,” World’s Champion Rudimental Drummer.” To the left it says:
“182 — 1st prizes. Cups and Medals.”
I
began my research on the guess that the non-uniformed man had to be a
relatively “big name” in rudimental drumming during the 1920s. I knew
that there were several powerhouse drummers during the ‘20s who would
regularly compete in drum corps contests held at American Legion posts
all around the country and that rudimental drumming, and these contests,
still had close ties to the military. After all, during the first two
decades of the 20th century, the snare drum in America was just starting
to see a shift from the battlefield to the concert hall. Many of the
most notable rudimental drum instructors during this era were veterans
of the Spanish-American war. Some of the greatest and most important
names in drumming flourished during the ’20s: J. Burns Moore, Sanford
Moeller, Dan English to name just a few. William F. Ludwig’s drum
company was still just becoming a household name in the percussion
community.
Wait.
There it was. Drum companies in the 20s were just starting to collect
endorsers - the best players they could get - and where else to
advertise their endorsements but in their catalogs? So off I went (one
tab over in my browser) to drumarchive.com. [Sidebar: If you haven’t
been to drumarchive.com, you really need to go there. Right now. It’s
amazing.] Anyway, I figured I would start with Ludwig, the biggest name
in drums at the time (and the company most contracted by the U.S.
government to manufacture service drums). I scrolled through a few
catalogs - 1922, nope…1923, no endorsers in that one either…1924,
nothing. Finally, as I’m scrolling through the 1927 catalog - debating
whether I’m even going in the right direction at all - there he is.
Frank S. Fancher. And he’s wearing a badge in this photo - an identical badge to the one being bestowed upon him in the LOC negative.
Frank
S. Fancher, World’s Champion snare drummer, making an appearance in the
1927 Ludwig catalog. This headshot was likely taken on the same day as
the Harris & Ewing negative.
So
I had a name, and from there I was able to finish the story. Fancher’s
name appeared in a few Ludwig company histories (and one Slingerland
history). There were a couple web pages about his relationship with drum
craftsman Odell M. Chapman and Fancher’s time with Chapman’s
Continental Drum Corps of Willimantic, CT. I found the obituaries
published in a 1966 issue of the Bridgeport Telegram newspaper and
learned that Fancher, “a champion drummer many years ago”, died on
Tuesday, February 1st, 1966 - less than a month after his friend, Odell
Chapman, passed away at his home in Newport. I learned that Fancher’s
drum - the one crafted by Chapman himself - lives on at the Company of
Fifers and Drummers Museum in Ivoryton, CT.
I found the last piece of the puzzle in Rob Cook’s The Ludwig Book: A Business History and Dating Guide Book. In
that text, Mr. Cook shares a postcard depicting two men - Frank Fancher
and William F. Ludwig wearing U.S. Army Band uniforms and carrying
Ludwig field drums - with the title “In the Inaugural Parade.
Washington, D.C. March 4th, 1925.” There was text on the back of the
postcard, too. It reads:
“Frank
Fancher and William F. Ludwig were honorary members of the United
States Army Band in the inauguration of President Coolidge on March 4th,
1925. Permission to play in the band, and honorary membership, was
conferred upon them by Captain Sherman for services rendered [to] the
U.S. School of Music and the U.S. Army Band in connection with the
promotion of rudimental drumming. On March 3rd, Frank Fancher won the
U.S. National Rudimental contest held at the Washington Barracks, DC.”
The postcard in question. An artifact that helps to tell its own story.
So
there you have it. One story told by one small artifact. And though
this story is but a pinpoint in a much larger and more illustrative
narrative, it still matters. It mattered to Frank Fancher. It matters to
me. And I’m sure it means something to anybody who has ever held a pair
of snare drum sticks and felt the weight of a drum on their shoulders,
or heard the sound of their instrument resonate through the concert
hall, surrounded by other musicians who love their craft.
What
we’ve learned (so far). We have a date, location, event, and a couple
names. Unfortunately the Sergeant First Class, Corporal, and Private
remain unidentified. Since it seems that they aren’t Army bandsmen
(judging by their cap and collar insignia) it will be much harder to
identify them, but we are currently trying to find more information on
the results of the 1925 U.S. National rudimental contest. If you have
any information at all, please let us know.
For
me its the journey of the artifact itself. Ninety-two years ago, a
photographer with Harris & Ewing, Inc. saw fit to imprint this
moment onto a glass plate. He was probably a freelance photographer with
the news service and took the photo with the idea of it being sold to a
local newspaper - these were two of the biggest names in drumming, in
town for the inaugural parade. But, for one reason or another, that
never happened. So there it sat, unpublished, in a storage room in the
studio at 1313 F Street NW, until George Harris retired in 1955 and gave
his entire collection of negatives to the Library of Congress. And
somehow, out of 70,000 negatives, this one was one of the 28,000 that
were turned into a digital file directly from the original. So thanks to
the preservation work by the Prints & Photographs Division staff, I
was able to stumble upon it while hanging out with my dog on a Sunday
afternoon. (Yeah. The internet is magic.)
But
that negative could just as easily have been destroyed. Just like so
many one-of-a-kind, hand-crafted snare drums that were thrown away by
unknowing grandchildren of Civil War veterans. Or beautiful,
hundred-year-old tambourines - with another hundred years of life left
in them, at least - that are “upcycled” into primitive wall decorations,
never to see a concert hall again. We all collectively, as
percussionists, need to preserve these artifacts and the stories they
carry with them.
So
go explore and go discover and cherish each detail you find. Find the
missing pieces of our past and bring them to light. Share them with each
other and pass them on to our future generation.
And remember that one day, an artifact will tell your story, too.
Happy hunting.
~Lexie
This
was the first edition of our new, weekly Sunday percussive-history hang
out. If you dig it, feel free to share with a friend who may also dig
it. If you have any questions, please shoot us an email at www.artifactpercussion.com/contact
Check
back next week to learn about one our favorite artifacts in our
collection: a one-of-a-kind WFL tambourine that jingle-jangled for
astronauts ;)
Drumarchive.com:
a free resource for drummers and percussionists containing the largest
collection of digitized catalogs on the internet. http://drumarchive.com/
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