I'm normally a fan of preserving what is left of a drum but this one arrived in such terrible shape that I went all out to restore it. Literature from the 1930s estimates Stromberg's total drum production to number only 300 - 400 so there aren't too many of these out there. To me this was another case for bring the drum back to life.
The shell and hoops went to Will Tillman (a.k.a. Drummers Dream) in Pennsylvania. Will repaired the damage to the batter side hoop and refinished the shell and hoops using vegetable dies and other period appropriate techniques. He also formed a new ebony grommet to replace the missing original. We avoided sanding down the shell to maintain some of the distress the shell had absorbed over the years. Apparently the owner of this drum didn't believe in drum cases..... which also explains why there was more plating worn off than left present on the hardware!
All of the metal parts (sans mounting hardware) went to Adrian Kirchler in Italy. AK was able to fabricate the missing tension rods, repair the strainer to functionality, and replate all of the hardware as it was originally done. A single layer of thin nickel plating really brought the twelve single-post brass tube lugs back to life.
The shell and hoops are beautifully crafted three ply maple which makes this a VERY early example of a multi-ply shell with staggered seams. (Stromberg was a Swedish immigrant and cabinet maker before going into musical instrument manufacturing so he had a strong background in woodworking.) There is a handwritten date on the inside of the shell from 1920 which is about right though it can't be authenticated for sure. The label inside, unfortunately, is mostly missing but this instrument appears to have been built by Stromberg for a music retailer in Rhode Island. The strainer and butt are stamped with the Stromberg name and patent dates respectively.
I tucked new Stern calf heads onto flesh hoops from Cooperman which I glued to size. The snare wires will be Adrian's reproduction wire wound silk.
So it probably was not a wise financial investment in the end, but I feel like it was worth the price to preserve a small piece of Boston drum building history.
-Lee
