 Hey guys, welcome to another episode of the show today. We have two very cool articles from the 1960s that have to do with premier or premier as people in the UK say, but these are pertaining to kind of Soviet Russia and the iron curtain and just some really cool stuff like that And I know there's some diehard premiere fans out there. So I think you guys will really enjoy this So this first article is from 1961 in the Lester evening mail from Lester Lester Shire England, which boy, I'm glad I googled how to pronounce that it looks like like Hester But it's pronounced Lester apparently it says they send drums behind the iron curtain Which remember the headline for this one because the actual amount of information provided about sending drums Behind the iron curtain is pretty short compared to the rest of the article, but it's still really cool But just it's kind of interesting to note. So this one says they send drums behind the iron curtain Wigston firm makes 35,000 a year if two young dance band drummers had not been Dissatisfied with the drums on the market 40 years ago. Wigston would not today house Europe's largest drum manufacturers writes Garth Bennett an evening mail staff reporter for that's how the premier drum co limited with factories in canal street South Wigston and Pullman Road Wigston Magna came to be founded one of the young men was Dr. Albert de la Porta The firms managing director he and colleagues opened a two-man factory in London 40 years ago next year Later when they got busy they employed a boy to help But during the last war the firm was bombed out So after the war the business was transferred to canal street South Wigston and today the firm manufactures 35,000 drums a year They also make other percussion instruments with West Germany being their best market last year The firm is looking forward to Britain's entry into the European common market Mr. Stevenson told me then it also says kind of a sub headline new drum head a New drum head or skin developed recently by premier just came through a tough test with flying colors It was used on drums of three Royal Marine bands in the Lord Mayor's show a letter received Afterwards told the firm that the skins were still in great shape at the end of the procession Despite rain falling on them throughout Premier believes in giving all their employees a thorough training and everything that goes on in its factory with the exception of Office girls everyone who joins the firm spends a period on the various processes in the works said mr Stevenson we like to be sure that all of our employees no matter what their jobs know exactly what goes on in the production line Our salesmen go through the procedure too at Premier They look to the future with confidence. This is obviously a very cool ad and like I mentioned It's just kind of neat how the headline says in huge bold letters like very big They send drums behind iron curtain, but really that was just a couple little lines And it didn't have anything negative It was you know saying they're looking forward to doing more business and obviously where it says that with the exception of the office girls That is not very cool and wouldn't fly today But it's obviously a different time not that it excuses it But it's neat to read it and and kind of learn from it So the next one we're gonna be looking at is from the Coventry evening Telegraph in Coventry, West Midlands England October 2nd 1964 this one is just Very very short some of these like the previous one I read was like a headline like like an article This next one is just like a little blurb that would be kind of you know on page six or whatever of the newspaper So this one says drums for Russia drums and equipment worth 11,200 pounds have been sold by the Premier drum co limited of South Wigston Lester Shire to RAS no export the official Russian purchasing organization I'm no expert on the Soviet Union and the iron curtain and all that stuff, but I do know it was very difficult To get quality drums in to the Soviet countries Particularly Russia and West Germany and all that stuff So I guess Premier had an in and they were providing drums for the Soviet Union Which is pretty neat to see that And it was in the paper. I guess it was almost a taboo, but it seems like it was worth noting that that was happening because again we're in the Cold War at this point and Premier they did good business with it. So anyway, pretty cool to see this stuff from the early 1960s This is a really a cool topic that I plan on doing a full episode on I've heard some stories about like flight attendants sneaking in drum sets or Levi's jeans and things like that like in their carry-ons That would be hard to bring a drum set in your carry-on luggage as a flight attendant But I think there's a lot of information there So that'll make for a cool episode down the road But for now, this has been a fun one and I appreciate you if you're listening on the podcast or if you're watching on YouTube Thanks for checking it out. So thank you to my friend Jerry Reiman who compiled the percussion in the news Binder he sent me which is completely full of these newspaper articles, which every time I look through it I find something new So lots of cool stuff to come. Thanks for checking this out and we'll see you next week