One of the intriguing aspects of collecting vintage drums is discovering when your instrument was made. Estimating the age of a drum can be done more or less by examining its badge type, style of hardware, shell construction/composition and interior/exterior finish. If you’re fortunate enough, your drum might even have a date stamp on the inside of its shell. But unlikely as it may seem, the broadcast of one television show in early 1964 played an unwitting role in helping to date more closely one particular brand of drum. To see how the story unfolds, let’s go back in time to February 9, 1964.

It was the day the Beatles appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show. Their television debut ushered in not only a new era for rock and roll, but something more. With the name "Ludwig" painted on Ringo’s bass drumhead, it marked also the beginning of the Ludwig Drum Company’s largest boom in their production history. "Even though we stepped up our production, the orders for our drums came in faster than we could make them," said William F. Ludwig II who was then the company’s General Manager and Vice President.

This new surge in Ludwig’s production and sales coincided with a new government regulation enacted at about the same time (The regulation was brought to our attention by drum historian/insurance agent, Harry Cangany). These overlapping events would intertwine to have a direct effect on the collecting and dating of 1960’s Ludwig drums. Prompted by the insurance industry, the new regulation mandated serial numbers on certain goods – including drums. (badge photo here) "Up until then," said Mr. Ludwig, "some of our drums were date stamped and some weren’t - but none had serial numbers. Our dealers begged us to put them on, so we had our badge manufacturer imprint sequential numbers on the badges for all of our drums."

With the debut of serial numbers, Ludwig helped the dealers comply with the new law. But unforeseen then to the drum company, these serial numbers would also be a key to unlock the mystery of how to date post-’63 Ludwig drums that weren’t date-stamped. Though in actuality, the way to pin down the elusive age of these drums would call more for the sharp pencil of a record keeper than the skill of a Sherlock Holmes.

Motivated by a growing number of customer inquiries about dating 60’s era Ludwig drums, as well as our own historical interest, we took on the task of record keeper. We began in the late 1980’s by monitoring all of the 60’s Ludwig drums that came into our shop. Thanks to the production boom of the 60’s, we had a large sampling of drums which provided enough data to do our research. When we found a drum with both a serial number and complete date stamp present, this data was entered into a serial number index. We hoped that, in time, the index would reveal a consistent chronological order in the serial number sequence. The reasoning for our optimism was that since the serial numbers were imprinted on the badges in a sequential order (of lower to higher numbers) and since the badges were installed over a duration of time – as represented by the date stamps inside of the shells, a direct relationship between the serial numbers and date stamps was inevitable, even though the Ludwig factory did not intend it.

As our record keeping continued and more serial numbers and dates were added to the index, the correlation between them became increasingly evident. Although we did find some discrepancies in this correlation - which we'll discuss later in this article - a general pattern emerged. The serial numbers increased as their corresponding date stamps moved forward in time.

In a recent conversation with Jack Lawton, restoration specialist and owner of the Lawton Drum Company (Sudbury, PA.), I discovered by chance that Jack had, over a 10 year period, also developed a serial number index like ours.

We decided to exchange and compare indexes. To our mutual relief, we found that the serial numbers and date stamps corresponded with one another and that the sequence of the serial numbers in both indexes followed the same general path through time.

Let’s have a look now at some numbers. Below is Ludwig 1960’s Serial Number Time Chart #1. It contains particular number/date stamp pairs chosen from our original serial number index because they serve as good representations of the chronological trend of the serial number sequence. By using this chart, you will be able to know in most cases the year, and time frame within the year, that your 1960’s Ludwig drum was made. For additional clarification we have included a few serial number/date stamp pairs provided by helpful collectors.

Here’s how to use the chart:

Taking as an example a non-date stamped drum with the serial number of 718,321, lets first find the proximate serial numbers to 718,321 - which are 689,430 and 743,080 respectively. Next, check the corresponding dates to these serial numbers - which are February 26, 1969 and September 4, 1969. These two dates indicate the general time frame when our non-date stamped drum was made.

Keep in mind when using the chart that due to Ludwig’s production, assembly and order-fulfillment procedures during the 60’s (discussion following the next chart) it’s not uncommon to find a moderate margin of discrepancy in the serial number/date stamp relationship. For this reason, the production date of the drum you’re dating could actually be several months earlier or later than the chart indicates.

I once asked Mr. Ludwig why only some of the shells were date stamped? He explained, "The reasons varied over the years. Sometimes it was because we wanted to accommodate certain dealers who didn't want the dates. Other times it was to keep up our production speed so that we could keep up with the demand. And sometimes it was just because the stamp pads ran out of ink."

Furthermore, not all of the dates that went on the drums stayed on the drums. Dick Gerlack, who recently retired from the Ludwig Drum Company as their quality control manager/ trainer/ buyer, was with the drum company from 1960 to 2001. He pointed out to me that because Ludwig used non-indelible ink for the stamping of the dates, some dates were inadvertantly smudged or removed - in part or whole – after the drums left the factory by drum owners while cleaning their drums.

The next Chart #2 gives an overview of the serial number sequence as it progressed from one year to the next. Using a simple formula, we have estimated, to the nearest thousand, the average count of serial numbers used for each individual year between 1964 and 1969. For those of you who enjoy mathematics, the formula is: 800,000 (the approximate aggregate of serial numbers used 1964 through 1969 based on our serial number index), divided by six (the quantity of years spanning 1964 through 1969), equals 133,000 (the average yearly increase in the serial number progression).

Based on this calculation, Chart #2 shows a cumulative yearly growth of 133,000 serial numbers from 1964 through 1969. Since each one of these serial numbers corresponds to one individual drum produced, then our 133,000 yearly estimate, if correct, would have to reconcile with Ludwig’s yearly tally of drums produced during that same period. To verify our calculations I asked both Mr. Ludwig and Mr. Gherlach how close our yearly serial number estimate was to the drum company’s yearly drum production output. Their respective answers were, "The 133,000 figure is extremely close to what we were doing" and "It’s right in the ballpark." When using chart 2, keep in mind that these serial numbers are close indicators only, i.e. the serial numbers marking the beginning and ending of each year cannot be distinctly established due to Ludwig's factory procedures just mentioned, and the discrepancies that those procedures caused in the serial number/date stamp-relationship.