harry pedler
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Sylvester,
First of all welcome to the SOTW forum.
I moved your inquiry to the appropriate forum (from the SOTW SPAM WATCH THREAD to MISC. SAXOPHONE MANUFACTURERS), because it was in the wrong area for such questions, and because it would have received little to no attention there.
English born Harry Pedler made some excellent clarinets when the factory was still in his ownership. However Mr. Pedler retired in 1930, and the Pedler Instrument Company was sold to Martin Band Instrument Company. These horns are marked Harry Pedler Co. Elkhart IN. In 1958, Martin Co. sold the Pedler Co. to Selmer U.S.A. and I believe the name pretty much disappeared, at least the woodwind side of things.
Now Martin is one of my all time favorite Saxophone manufacturers, and those branded as such are top of the line. However when they acquired the Pedler name and factory, they turned the Pedler marked instruments into one of their entry level student product lines. These later Pedler products are not held in very high regard.
If your horn dates to the era of Harry himself, then you might have an interesting piece, if only from a collector's point of view.
I must admit that, although I own a few pre and post Martin takeover Pedler Clarinets, I have never seen or heard of a Pedler Saxophone.
You might have some luck contacting this individual, who collects the Harry Pedler, pre Martin, metal clarinets:
taxijazz at sbcglobal dot net
First of all welcome to the SOTW forum.
I moved your inquiry to the appropriate forum (from the SOTW SPAM WATCH THREAD to MISC. SAXOPHONE MANUFACTURERS), because it was in the wrong area for such questions, and because it would have received little to no attention there.
English born Harry Pedler made some excellent clarinets when the factory was still in his ownership. However Mr. Pedler retired in 1930, and the Pedler Instrument Company was sold to Martin Band Instrument Company. These horns are marked Harry Pedler Co. Elkhart IN. In 1958, Martin Co. sold the Pedler Co. to Selmer U.S.A. and I believe the name pretty much disappeared, at least the woodwind side of things.
Now Martin is one of my all time favorite Saxophone manufacturers, and those branded as such are top of the line. However when they acquired the Pedler name and factory, they turned the Pedler marked instruments into one of their entry level student product lines. These later Pedler products are not held in very high regard.
If your horn dates to the era of Harry himself, then you might have an interesting piece, if only from a collector's point of view.
I must admit that, although I own a few pre and post Martin takeover Pedler Clarinets, I have never seen or heard of a Pedler Saxophone.
You might have some luck contacting this individual, who collects the Harry Pedler, pre Martin, metal clarinets:
taxijazz at sbcglobal dot net
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21,498 Posts
The only Pedler saxes I have seen are similar to a Martin Committee. If your horn has soldered beveled tone holes and both of the bell keys on the left side, I suspect it is one of these.
I came across this website - might be helpful: http://www.trumpet-history.com/The Harry Pedler Companies.htm
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3,688 Posts
I'm not sure if and when the quality of Pedler horns began to decline, but the company itself started to fail in the early 1950s, allegedly due to growing competition from imported horns. C.J. Thompson, Vice-President of the Harry Pedler Company, testified to the US Tariff Commission in 1952 that the company had operated at a loss the previous year because they were "'unable to compete with the imported woodwind instruments regardless of our modern machinery and the efficiency of our employees. . . .'" (Charles Vandeveer Reed, "A History of Band Instrument Manufacturing in Elkhart Indiana," 1953).
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3,803 Posts
Yes, and that seller. What a whack job. God bless him.
Which led me to finding this thread (from 2007) and the article I posted.
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71 Posts
Hey, I have a Harry Pedler and Sons New Triumph tenor. I've always thought it was a Martin stencil. It has the beveled tone holes and sn 24XXX, so 1914 I believe. It was overhauled years ago with wavy metal resonators but hardly played since then, so it still plays great. How much did we decide it's worth and where are these collectors? I've got one too many tenors and still want to buy a shinier one that I'll actually play.
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