 Welcome to the Drum History podcast. I'm your host Bart van der Zee and today I'm joined by Steve Zamanic. Steve, welcome to the show. Thank you for having me. I appreciate it. Yeah. So today we are here to talk about your awesome new book, The Ludwig Line, Bass Drum Pedals. And I got to give a shout out to Vincent Ward, who's a great friend of the show, who has referred to you on multiple occasions on his episodes as being, you know, kind of a guru about pedals. He's a great guy, known him for years. I'm glad he recommended me. Thank you, Vince. So I'd like to start just by hearing a little bit about what got you into this very specific, you know, area of not only drum history, but then Ludwig history. So this is pretty specific. What got you into this? Well, basically, I've been playing Ludwig drums since I've been in fifth grade. And throughout the different machinations in the years, I ended up with bass drum pedals. And it's just a fun thing to do. Doesn't take up a lot of space. And I've just had a ball doing it. Yeah. That is a great point because I've found myself kind of being in that world of I don't really collect them, but I've had multiple over the years of the old Japanese drums where I bought them because they're cheap and I can afford them. Sure. It's like similar to the bass drum pedals where it's small, you can put them on a shelf. I wish I was the guy who had these like Mike Corrado had 650 snares scattered around my house. Right. But unfortunately, I'm not. So that's cool. I just love that. There's a real purpose to it. So Ludwig is widely known as basically inventing the bass drum pedal as we know it today, 1909. I know that there's Yes. Like anything, there's people who probably debate that around the world. Maybe someone did it a little earlier. There's the overhang pedals. There's all that. But for the sake of Ludwig and you can touch on that as much as you want on the who did it first stuff. But why don't we start at the beginning here of the Ludwig line of bass drum pedals? Well, you know, you're absolutely right. You know, the debate could rage on forever in a day. But their claim to fame is they made the first commercially successful bass drum pedal. Yep. And it's compact. You could fold it up back in the day. All the drummers used to sit there and take street cars that are gigs. So they needed to have portable equipment that they go jump on the trolley or bus or whatever it might be. And their pedal was durable. It folded up. You put it in your overcoat, hopped on the bus and went and held up through all the beats through all the drummers in all the theaters. They didn't break. And that's why they became famous and successful with the bass drum pedal. Yeah, you know, it reminds me of the as far as my show goes, the only controversy there's ever been is the debate between Remo and Evans and who was first. And really, that was like, okay, technically Evans was first, but Remo was the first like commercially successful figure it out, mass produce it. So I guess there's that caveat of, yeah, Ludwig being the first really dialed in commercial one, which is fascinating. And you're right. There's been hundreds of different bass drum pedals before that back into the 1800s, so on and so forth. But nobody could make one that worked consistently and well. Yeah. Yeah. And remind me my Ludwig history is a little I need to touch up on it. So obviously we're talking about WFL one, so William F. Ludwig the first and his brother whose name was Theobald. Theobald. That's right. I was like, I'm going to get this right. I didn't know if it was Ulysses, but that's that's Leedy. All right. So William and Theobald start the company. They're making the bass drum pedals. Would you call it an overnight success from what in your research? Yes. And it basically started at a barn and William F. Ludwig was starting to do this. And his brother Theobald was out on the road doing gigs around the country. He came back, saw what his brother was doing, and he started helping him assemble these. One thing led to another. And after a few months, all along the Chicago area, people heard about it. Now they're selling more and more and more. They all quit their gigs and just started the company. Bam, there you go. That's how Ludwig and Ludwig started. That's fascinating. I love that because obviously it sounds like they weren't traditional like businessmen per se. Oh, no. Yeah. There's stuff with a circus, if I'm not mistaken, right? They played so many different things from orchestral on down through the theater drummer. They were true drummers in every sense of the word. Yeah. That's awesome. Okay. So we got that pedal. And I guess to keep it easy, let's go chronological through them and talk about them as we go. So the 1909 pedal, what was that one called? You can't really say anything else than it's the original pedal. They really didn't have a name for it per se. It's always been listed as the original pedal. Got it. That's good to know. So how long is that in existence? And then where do we go from there? Well, they kept it in their books up until World War II. I probably should know because things progressed that far. But, you know, Theobald died soon after, within a few years of the company being formed. And I don't think William F. Ludwig could just ever let it go. This started the company. This is my baby. I'm keeping it in the book. So if you want it, great. It's there. Wow, that's fascinating. And I guess as we go, because I get confused with it, at this point, it's Ludwig and Ludwig, correct? Right. And it went through different variations through the years. It took me a while to really get a grasp of all this because Ludwig and Ludwig was there for a while. 1929 comes along, going through the Depression. Both Ludwig and Ludwig and Liddy were sold to C.G. Kahn because, well, as you mentioned, they weren't quite the best businessmen. And they let the companies go. And then we have C.G. Kahn producing both pedals, and actually William F. Ludwig was sitting there working for C.G. Kahn. He got fed up, left. And that's when he invented or started William F. Ludwig Company. So it got to a point when C.G. Kahn said, no, you can't use the name Ludwig. Now WFL comes into play. So after World War II and 1959, that's when C.G. Kahn says, you know what, well, actually I should go before that and say after World War II, they made it Liddy and Ludwig form both companies into one. And then in 1955, C.G. Kahn said, well, you know what, we don't want to do this anymore. So then they sold off both companies. And that's when William F. Ludwig got the Ludwig name back and formed Ludwig. So from 1955 on, that's now known as Ludwig WFL is gone. In 1975, they bought Ghost and they kept that until 1981. And then somewhere along the line, they actually sold the company back to Kahn and moved it to Monroe. So the family was finally out of it once and for all. Wow. So to clarify, Ludwig wasn't actually just singular Ludwig until 1959. Before that, it was Ludwig and Ludwig, Liddy and Ludwig, WFL on its own separately. But when he bought it back was the first time that it was actually just solo Ludwig. Is that right? Right, 1955. 1955, okay. That's good to know. I've researched it and looked into it a thousand times. And that was a very clear explanation. So I appreciate that. It is confusing how the machinations went through all the different corporations buying and selling. I understand. Yeah. And it's so interesting too about how when Ludwig was sold to Kahn and then WFL was like, I don't want to... So he just basically said, I don't want to work for another person. I want to go and do my own company, right? Right. He couldn't take it anymore. They wouldn't listen to his suggestions. Yeah. Even though he's the mastermind. Yeah. And he started that in 1937. So 37 to 55 was WFL. That's good to know for dating pedals and anything where if you have a WFL drum, it's going to be within that or pedal. It's going to be in that timeframe. I have to give a little caveat there because it was William F. Ludwig from 37 to 39. And then CG Kahn finally made him stop at 39 once and for all. So from 39 to 55 is when it was WFL. Okay. Even more little... It's just you got to keep it all straight with the dates, but that was great. All right. Let's back up here. You said that the original pedal existed from 1909 to World War II. Is that right or World War I? Two. They kept it in the catalogs through 1945 when Pearl Harbor happened. Yes. That's when the whole world changed for all of them. That's a long time. Did they have other pedals in the line along that way? I don't know when the various other famous Ludwig pedals came in. When did we get those? Oh, absolutely. I mean, they didn't just stop there. They kept going and they pretty much got into different variations of things. They made a side pedal for theater drummers. You couldn't have the bass drum in front of you because the stage was too small. So they put the bass drum off to the right. So the pedal was at an angle, which was really strange. And they made the Ludwig Junior, the Ludwig Midget. They did the alternating pedal, which means you could sit there and you would play the cymbal with your foot pedal. But if you hit a certain part of it, it wouldn't hit the cymbal. It alternated on and off. Sure. They made so many different pedals throughout this time frame. What's your as a real historian of this, what would you say is your favorite kind of little thing that you've come across? I mean, obviously that side pedal is fascinating. But what would you say is your favorite pedal of this era? If you had to pick one. Oh my. I mean, there's so many. I actually like the World War II pedal. They made one and Ludwig made one. They were made out of wood because of the 10% metal restrictions. But their alternating pedals are absolutely phenomenal and a mechanical marvel to me. I just love those things. Have you seen them? Do you have any of them? Oh, yeah. I have all but six pedals that were produced. Oh, wow. And in my mind, there's two Leedy and Ludwig versions. I don't think they ever really produced but put in catalogs. So I think there's only four that I'm really missing. Yeah. You read my mind of a question to ask of were there things that were, you know, illustrated or they made a prototype and it just didn't exist. And I don't know if you have any knowledge about that. But I'm so curious on that of like, why do that? What do you do if someone calls and says, hey, I want the, you know, pedal, you know, Z or whatever. And it doesn't, it literally doesn't exist. Like what would you say on the phone? Like, oh, we're still in the works or, you know, what's the process with that? Why would they do that? Well, they had two pedals that they actually had patents on but never produced. So in 1909, they came up with their first patent but never produced that pedal. And if you ever really looked at it and cared to look at it, in my mind, it was the first machination again of the speed King. Oh, wow. So if you come along later in the years when you see that William F. Ludwig produced the first speed King, it really kind of mimics that first patent that was never produced. Wow. Yeah, that's interesting. And then when they came along with the second patent, that's the famous 1909 pedal that everybody sees. It was a lot simpler than that. So it might have been money why they didn't produce that first prototype. Yeah. I mean, just because you come up with an idea. I mean, it sounds like they in their minds are on like the drawing board sort of figured out, hey, maybe this isn't going to work. Let's do this second one as opposed to like you said, wasting money and time. Right. Yeah. Exactly. I just think it was too complicated. Now, when did they start? Obviously, we're talking about pedals, but I should know this, but when did they start actually? So they started with pedals, obviously 1909. That's really what got them going. When did they produce their first drums? Okay. This is not exactly my area of expertise, but I'm going to say 1912 is when you start seeing those drums show up. Gotcha. And I think they started with a snare drum and then they slowly built the kit. Yeah. Yeah. I know I've done like the multiple Ludwig episodes and I can't remember the earliest that it came up, but that obviously sounds about right. Maybe the explosion of success gave them the capital to, hey, let's get into building the actual drums. Why not? Right. Exactly. Yeah. Okay. So now was the technology of the original pedal kind of the framework of a lot of these pedals they made over that next 20, 30 years or obviously it probably evolved into what we know as the speed king. But you know what I mean? Like was that original patent basically their brain behind a lot of it for a while? Does that make sense or did they evolve pretty quickly? There was so many different variations of pedals throughout the years that the theater drummers had to use. There's no concrete evidence of this, but I fully believe they took all those ideas and that's what formed making their pedal. One of the big things was making it out of metal with all metal parts. So it wouldn't be destroyed going through the years. And let's face it, you see the original bass drum pedal online right now that you could buy for probably $50. They're still in existence 110 years later and you can still use them. That's how well they made them. Yeah. That's unbelievable. So when you say, you know, all metal in my experience of seeing them and I cannot remember who the inventor, I saw it at the New Orleans Jazz Museum. Like the overhang pedal or some of those earlier pedals were wood. Right. Which not very durable compared to metal. Oh no. You can see it in the World War II pedals. You know, I have one of them. The parts just disintegrate. Somebody pours a drink on it. You know how, you know, moisture goes with wood. It's not going to work. That's a mention. You know, you're sitting there with your foot stamping up and down on it. Wood's going to split. It just doesn't work. No. But like everything with history, you don't know what you don't know. You don't think, let me, you know, forge this out of metal and get it like a, you know, it cast to be in this shape and all this. It's definitely, a lot of things with the history of drums builds up. One thing leads to another, which leads to another, which very important. Exactly. Yeah. And you know this as well as I do. You know, there's all different applications. I'm big into using InDesign and Illustrator and Photoshop. When they update it, they always think they're doing you a favor. Well, not always. You should have kind of kept that part the way it was. Yeah. Oh man, I know what you mean. Okay. So is there anything, so maybe we call this, so would this be maybe considered the first era, you know, that pre-World War II era? Well, I should ask then and I feel like I know this because of Vincent's great Speed King episode, but when did the Speed King come into play, which is very iconic, probably the most iconic pedal in history next to like the 5,000 pedal? 1937. Okay. All right. And I believe you said that before. 1937, the Speed King comes in. Did that just change the world? You know, was that a big, big deal when it came out? Sure. Because in the world of like bass drum pedals, it was just so iconic. I mean, they had twin towers with the springs enclosed in it and you could just beat the living hell out of that thing and it worked. The recoil action on it, the durability, it's just phenomenal. I mean, design changed throughout the years, the footboard and how the towers looked a little bit, but until they discontinued it, the design per se did not change a lot over the years. Even when they brought it back just this year, it stayed the same. What were the beaters? And maybe this goes back to 1909 too when we talk about the evolution of here, but what were the beaters typically made out of? Like, let's say the earliest bass drum pedal. It was Lambswool. Lambswool. Yeah. They used that and they would generally offer, well, actually they came up with three. They did Felt, Wood and Lambswool. But Lambswool was pretty much the big one back in the day because drummers were supposed to be there. You know, this wasn't the gene crew by era or anything like that. You were supposed to be there. You kept the beat. We don't want you loud. We're not talking John Bonham here, you know? So that's why, you know, Lambswool beaters were good. You keep the beat, it could be heard, but it wasn't loud. Yeah. Yeah. That's, there's an episode that I did that's about 1920s drummers. And I can't remember specifically what he said, but there was something where it was like literally like it was a rule where drummers couldn't use certain, like you couldn't use your snare or bass or you had to use just little like kind of effects things for a couple of years on recordings because it was overpowering everything. Exactly. Drummers were, we were putting in the background for sure. Oh. Oh, you know what? But you know what? Rock music wouldn't exist today in my mind without the drummer. Could you imagine any song without the drummer? No. No, not at all. I mean, then it's singer-songwriter. I mean, which is great. But you have to have a drummer for that, you know, heavy metal music, all this stuff. It all revolves around the drummer. It does. Cheers to us, man. Cheers to us. We rock. That's great. All right. So 37 Speed King. That's an interesting thing because then obviously the Speed King, now it was the Speed King originally released. If my dates are correct, was that originally a William F. Ludwig WFL invention under that umbrella instead of it being a con, you know, Ludwig and Ludwig? That was the first pedal William F. Ludwig issued when he broke off from CGCon and quit his job. Wow. That's what he started his new company with. That's like symbolic. You know what I mean? He started in 1909 with a pedal. He goes off on his own and starts a pedal. Pretty cool. It is. But by that point, he knew so much about the industry. He just jumped in. He was making the sets, everything right off the bat. Of course. Yeah, those are really cool. I remember Bill Ludwig III talked about on an episode. He took a picture off the wall and it was a photo of his dad. No, it would be his grandpa. It would be WFL I and he looked at it and it said starting over on the bottom when he was starting over the WFL factory, which is very, very, it's all very powerful. Good for him. And it really clearly worked out well. And that was one of the big things when he went back and bought the name back in 1955. One of the requirements was I want all my original equipment back. Yeah. That was his thing. I mean, he knew how to make drums and those pieces of equipment were just such quality of machines. He kept on with them to the end probably using them. Well, it sounds like if you oil things properly in that day, it sounds like it's dip. I mean, now everything is obviously very electrical and robots and stuff. But with those old machines, they probably weighed 10 tons. And if you oiled them, they'd run forever, you know? And you know it is. Everything's disposable now. It breaks now. You just throw it away and get a new one. It costs too much to repair. Yeah. Yeah, that's true. All right. So then with the WFL, the Speed King, it's not that long before we get into the wooden pedals of World War II. What were the... Did those pedals have a name? What were the lines of drums that were for Ludwig and WFL? I know there's the Rolling Bomber with Slingerland. What was Ludwig's line called? Was it the... Well, WFL was the victorious. Okay, that's right. And Ludwig and Ludwig was the victory. Come on. It's so close. It's like... Who copied Hill? Who came out first? And then I've always tried to find out and I never could. I think within a few months in 1942 is when they both issued them. Gotcha. Now, when did WFL II become a major player in the company? Because if I'm Googling it, I always get kind of that little... There's so many little things to keep in mind. William F. Ludwig II was born in 1916. So when did he join the company and become a member of the drum community and start leading things? Well, if memory serves me correctly, he jumped right in when dad formed William F. Ludwig in 1937. And then the war came about and he joined the service. So he did his stint, came back and really got steeped into the business. And as far as I'm concerned, once they took over in 1955 and they bought the name back from CGCon, it was his. That's when two really took the reins. Gotcha. Okay, the chief. Right. So, last thing with the wooden pedals, just because I think it's fascinating, do you have any kind of like... Is there any little quirks that you've found? Obviously, you said you own one or two, right? One of them. Okay. Yeah, they're rare. I mean, they're super rare. Where did you find it? How did you acquire one? Oh my God. Do you know Mark Cooper? Yeah. He's been on the show. I started out with him. See, what I do is I blast out emails to people. Even if I see somebody obscure, I'll send them an email saying, I'm looking for these things. Sooner or later, one person leads you to another, so all the way down the line. And I was just able to pick one up for somebody that Mark had sold it to. And it was in such bad shape, but you can't pass it up because you'll never see it again. Yeah. Man, because they just, like you said, they just deteriorate. I mean, they go away. And so that's not really something you're out playing every night. You're not gigging with your wooden pedal. Oh no. Mine has deteriorated pretty much, but I was able to stabilize it. I stripped off the silver paint that some guy spray painted on there. Got it back to its original gunmetal gray. And it's a pretty nice looking pedal now, but you would never use it, ever. No. It's cool to see also like the wooden snare stands and stuff like that. Actually, to be honest with you, Mike Carrotta was the one that I actually got the pedal from and I inadvertently years later got one of the wooden stands from him. Cool. And I couldn't use the stand. I tried to use it for trade bait to get one of the victory drum pedals, but it didn't work, so I sold the stand off. Yeah. You know, what do you do? Easy go. You can't hold on to everything forever. You can't. Just not enough room, at least in my house. No. No, that's for sure. Okay. That's awesome. I wonder how many of those pedals they sold. You know what I mean? Like at that point in time, it just seems like everyone was a little distracted doing other things. A lot of servicemen were overseas. Like they probably didn't sell a million pedals, you know? You got to know this as well as me. That wig was terrible at keeping track of anything. Yeah. You could see a transition badge on a drum in 1965, and we all know the transition badge here ended in 60. Yeah. Whatever was laying around, whatever part, you just used them whenever. They kept track of nothing. Man. So, I get this question all the time and you just mentioned transition. Obviously, transition badge, the transition is referring to 1955 when WFL got his name back. He took it back from Khan. They sold it. Can you talk a little bit about what that transition was and what the badge looks like and all that good stuff? Okay. Basically, what happened when they bought the company back in 1955, that was their transition from WFL to Ludwig. So, they took about a year or two. They put a new catalog out. The transition badge was in that era up until 1960. And it's the Keystone badge. It's got a blue oval center in it. Okay. Then in 1960, they came out with just the Keystone badge. It's all brass. And the little blue oval is gone. Now it's Ludwig. It's truly just the new Ludwig. Okay. Cool. Well, thanks for clarifying that. You never want to take for granted that everyone knows something, especially if they're newer to the drum world and you keep hearing something and sometimes it's nice to ask those simple questions, though. All right. Let's get back to pedals then. We're at the end of the war. We're back to regular life as regular as it can be. Where do we go from there? And, you know, before we do that, I also want to ask, it made me think because regular life, obviously Europe was not in regular. I mean, Europe was, much of Europe was destroyed. That makes me think how international was Ludwig at this point? Do you know if drummers all over the world are using Ludwig pedals and drums? Or is it primarily US? I know they are, but it's obviously it's a big import. It's expensive. How does the international Ludwig world look? It's the United States. That's pretty much it. You hit it on the head. Back of the day, it's like, okay, it's like getting a fiat here. Oh my God. What a rarity and the price was sky high. Same thing over there. Little by little after the war, they started dribbling into Europe and so on and so forth, but they were expensive. Especially in England, Pearl, that was it. You had a Ludwig. We see where that went in 1964, right? Yeah. Big time, which we're about to get there. That's where it exploded and that's when Ludwig became famous. Oh yeah. 24 hours a day, as they say, the factories churning out drums. Right. One thing I want to note on too is that I've heard from multiple people that in various countries, there'd be copycats who would come out and maybe they get their hands on a pedal and they make, I don't know of this at all with Ludwig. I know there was Penguin or Penguin in Brazil makes really good Ludwig copies that I think went back to the 50s. I recently did an episode on electronic drums and they talked about Soviet, Russia would acquire electronic drums and they'd have scientists who would recreate them for their purposes in Russia. So it makes me wonder how, if they were copying Ludwig designs, I'm sure they were. Oh, absolutely. I've seen so many different pedals with the footboard, especially the original footboard. And I've got to believe that Ludwig was steeped in making drums, not the peripherals, like the pedal itself. I've seen so many Wahlberg and Auge pedals with that footboard. Yeah. So I think they were making the footboards and then somebody else copied, copied, copied. It just, yeah. Yeah. Which happens. And the international thing and even nationally here in the United States, it's hard to, do you want to chase patents and sue people or do you want to make drums and make pedals? What are you going to spend time doing? Right. It would just cost you so much. And unless you're a mega corporation with pockets that are so deep, you can't pursue it. Absolutely. Okay. So I'm sure there's someone there sitting there talking saying, aren't we here for pedals? Let's talk about pedals. We are one way or another. All these things tie in. They do. All right. So you said at 1964, Ringo touched on there with, about the pedals. That was a speed king, correct? Yes. So, man, that really changed everything, right? What's your thoughts on the Ringo explosion? Well, what it was as a nutshell is, that was the big deal in England, a Ludwig set. And he walks into the shop and they try to sell him one thing and he sees that Black Diamond Pearl set and that was it. He fell in love with it. Oh my God. So it was a foreign set. Oh my God, to have a foreign set made by Ludwig. I know they're very good. And you know what happened after that. It just exploded that night in February. Yeah. Because he had premiere before that, if I'm not mistaken. That's his local. It's just so different because like you didn't really go outside of your, you know, the UK. You didn't? Okay. So he's using the speed king. You know, that it's so interesting how the Ludwig, I remember hearing in an episode that people were calling saying, I want the Ringo. And they said the switchboard operators were like, the hell's the Ringo? They were even ready for it. Right. Oh, I literally overnight. Yeah. If he's got it, I want it. Was Ludwig now still making a ton of different crazy, you know, unique pedals? Or had they kind of honed in their line? Like the SKUs, if you will. Or did they have a ton of different pedals and lines and things going on at this time too? No, they had many different pedals there. Because inadvertently, the other thing that happened along the way is the cocktail set was invented. Yep. Okay. The Miami beach, so on and so forth. The guy could sit there again on a little stage and just have a drum that had actually a snare in it. But you know, you had the pedal, you hit the underside of the cocktail set, a couple of cymbals, maybe a wood block, okay? Yep. Great. So they have what's called a reversible pedal. If you want to sit there and play it on your bass drum the regular way, great. You take the screw out, you change the way the beater is. Bam. Now you can use it on your cocktail drum. So they've got that. They still had the Ludwig Jr. They had the reversible. Now Ghost is coming into play with them, so they're doing that. They've just had many, many pedals. It wasn't until later in the years that they started scaling back and getting rid of these things. Like the Ludwig Jr. was virtually gone by the end of the 50s, maybe into the 60s. Can we talk about Ghost for a little bit? So you said Ludwig acquired Ghost. I don't know much about that at all. Like what's the story with like what, who was Ghost before it became, you know, part of Ludwig? I love Ghost. To this day I have a Ghost on my drum set. Absolutely love it. And Bob Ramsey invented it on board ship because there was a drummer on the ship and he wanted a durable pedal. And he came up with the Ghost. And it has two coiled springs in it in the housing as opposed to just regular springs that bounce up and down. And that was his invention. So after World War II he started making, he applied for patents, started making them. So on and so forth down the line until it got to the point, and again I can't find definitively why he didn't want the company anymore. Maybe he got too old. Who knows? Maybe he got a great deal. But then he sold it to William F. Ludwig II or the chief and that's when they took it over in 75. Wow, fascinating. Many, many times in history there's been just a, more or less a regular guy who invents a pedal like that. Like the DW 5000 double pedal and things like that. Sure. Where then it goes to a company, which it's just awesome, you know. Regular musicians can do things like that. Oh, absolutely. Necessity is the mother of an invention. Yeah. I mean, that's why William F. Ludwig I started the first bass drum pedal that was commercially successful. Exactly. It's so cool it's on a ship too. It's almost like a movie or something, you know. I can't remember that. They called it the, I think the ship was called the Galloping Ghost. Wow. I can't remember the exact name of the ship offhand, but that's how it got its name because the ship was nicknamed the Galloping Ghost. Fascinating. Okay. So all right, we're in the 60s here. There's many different pedals going on, but obviously the Speed King is their flag ship, right? Oh yeah, that's the bread and butter. Absolutely. Okay. So just, yeah, keep going there. What else do we have in the 60s into the 70s? What happens there with pedals? Well, they're keying more in on drums at this point. And since the Speed King is such a staple, and it's a horse, aside from everybody calling it the Squeak King. Yeah. And you'll hear it on Beatles records. You can hear Ringo's pedal squeaking. Yep. They got into Vistalights and so on and so forth. They really scaled down on different pedals they were making. So the reversible happened to fade away. The Juvenile faded away. They just keied it on drums. I mean, smart. It takes a lot of money and time. And if you're not selling something that's especially made out of metal, you know what I mean? I feel like nothing made out of metal is cheap and easy to make. You've got to actually create the things. The last oddball they kind of like introduced in a timeframe. And I really steeped in from 1909 to 1969 was the Fury. It's called the Standard Fury. That was their subline of Ludwig Drums, the Standard Line. And that's the pedal they made that was a companion to the Speed King as their workhorse. Yeah. The standards have really... Maybe it's died down a little bit, but they really came up in popularity. They did. They're very... I mean, again, it's like a drum set where you saw it for 300, 400 bucks and it went up to like, you know, I don't know a price, maybe like $1,000 or something where it's like... Sure. God, I remember seeing one on the Super Bowl. Or no, no. It was the New Year's Eve, you know, the ball drop thing a couple years ago. And I think it was Cheryl Crowe's drummer was using a standard kit. And I was like, oh, okay. Right when all that was happening where they were getting really popular. Like, man, beginner level drums. I missed it. I would like to see that. Yeah. All right. So, like you said, your book really focuses up to 69. But I'm sure you have knowledge to take us through a little bit further. So, you know, where do we go? Just touch on the rest of that just a little bit if you can. Well, what I focused in on after that point was... Because I wasn't just going to dead stop at 69. Yeah. Because pedals ended after that or so on and so forth. So I just took it to the end with ghost based drum pedals and the speed kings. That's what I really focused in to end my publication. You know, going through the different variations of when it went from Bob Ramsey and the ghost to when WFL2 took it over to when it ended. And I don't know if you know this or not, but they ended the ghost because it was too hard to make. Really? Coiling those springs was so hard. And it was starting to injure the employees in the Ludwig factories. They finally said, enough is enough. We don't want to send this overseas to go and do it. It's just done. Wow. So in 1981, that's gone. And then the speed kings, you know, I pretty much took it through to like 2014 when it ended. Because that's when they stopped making them. And it had been moved down to Monroe at that point. And I just kind of basically touched on when it was reissued last year. But there's really not a lot to say about a lot of the Ludwig pedals after about 1980, per se. Because it was so scaled back. Yeah. And I don't know if this is the right way to put it, but I feel like in, you know, the thirties and forties and fifties, it was, I don't want to say the Wild West, but it was more just like things are being created and invented. I feel like in the eighties, nineties, two thousands, everything was a little bit more standardized, maybe more. It was. Yeah. Less unique, wild, crazy pedals that are hitting symbols, which maybe that'll maybe that'll change now. You know, I've seen some of the magnet drive pedals or pedal where it's just using strong magnets to control the. Right. Like there's no drive. I guess that's the drive. Um, do you touch on high hat pedals at all in your, is that anywhere in your wheelhouse? No, no. If it was base drum pedal, I had to stop somewhere because otherwise I would go insane with a sock pedal and so on. No, I just ended it right there at base drum pedals. Okay. Smart for your own sanity. You know where to, you know where to stop. I mean, they even had the alternating pedal back in the day and there's the attachment to it that went on the base drum with the symbol. I didn't even go into the attachment with the symbol. It wasn't the base drum pedal. Yeah. I had to stop somewhere. Yeah. Wow. Unbelievable. I mean, it's such an iconic brand in their pedals and everything. What's your favorite? What's your favorite? I mean, I know you said the ghost, so that's probably the answer, but what's your favorite? Let's say what's your favorite era of speed King? Well, I always liked the mid 60s. I mean, I've had those and I actually did go back and forth with my ghost on my set and I've even played out, you know, at concerts with the speed King from the mid 60s. I like those. Nice and universal. They're durable. They were, you know, kind of modernized and pretty much standard from the mid 60s through and they were discontinued. So that's what I kind of stuck with other than the ghost. Yeah. Unbelievable. People will hate me, but I like the ghost much better. The action on those is phenomenal. I think it's cool that in the world of Ludwig, you can have a favorite that might be different than everyone else's favorite because we're all different. You know, we all play differently. All of our feet are different. So let's talk about your book a little bit more because obviously you own all most of these pedals. I'm assuming that a lot of the pictures and everything in the book is pictures of your collection. Is that right? Absolutely. Yeah. I went in my basement, took all the pictures. I wrote the whole book, did the research, laid out the pages and published it. Cool. Now give us the full title, including like you said, there's like a subtitle with the descriptions of the, you know, of the eras. What is the full title of the book? Well, it's called the Ludwig line bass drum pedals. And then it just details out after that, the transition from Ludwig and Ludwig, William F Ludwig, WFL, Leedy and Ludwig, Ludwig and Ghost from 1909 to 1969. Great. Where can people find it? I'm assuming you can just Google it probably and it'll pop up somewhere. But where do you like to direct people? Well, you know, if they want to contact me and they want to purchase a copy, I ask them if they send me a text or they send me an email at essayzamanic1athotmail.com and I'll give them the information so they can go and purchase it. Awesome. And you're going to be able to do it faster than me. Can you please spell your last name? Cause you're like me where there's a name, it's a name people have trouble with. Z as in zebra, Z E M A N E K. Perfect. I can't tell you how many times in my life I have said Z as in zebra on the phone to people expelling my last name. Yeah. They don't know if it's an E or a C you're saying. Yeah, I get it. Yeah, that's awesome. Okay, cool. Well, these hard to pronounce Czechoslovakian names. Oh, that's what it is. Czechoslovakian. Cool. Yes. I think my grandpa had some check on one side, but mine as we were talking before is a Dutch last name. But it's the burden we carry for interesting last names to have to spell it over the phone. I'm fine with it. I'm not willing to change it. Oh, this is awesome. So, all right. And again, a huge thank you to Vincent Ward for kind of getting us connected here. I mean, this is just such a neat thing. And Steve is kind enough to hang out for a little bit after and we're going to do one of the Patreon bonus episodes. And I'd like to hear a little bit more about maybe we talk a little bit more about your collection, how you restore these. Maybe we talk a little bit about like the state you find a pedal versus how it ends up. And maybe some tips on how people can get into collecting. Because as Vincent has said in some of his episodes and like you said, it's not like you're getting into top hat and cane kits that are $10,000, $20,000. These are pretty affordable. You know, it's a nice way to get into a collection. It is. And quite frankly, when you find a rare one and you know you'll never see it again, I've gone off the deep end. I spent 350 on one pedal because I knew I would never see it again. But for the most part, you're going to spend anywhere from 50 to 100 tops. Yeah. But like, even as you say that, I mean, yes, for pedals, sure, but $350. That is not really the deep end. That's not you're like in massive debt. I mean, it is for pedals. That's pretty far. But that's if that's the deep end, then I think this is a pretty safe hobby. It really is. It truly is. Yeah. That's funny. All right. Well, okay. As we wrap up here and kind of get ready to do the Patreon bonus episode, is there any other cool little Ludwig tidbits, fun facts, you know, factory info that you found out that you want to share with the listeners? Oh, geez. You're kind of putting me on the spot there. I know. Again, you know, it's just the hardest thing with these is especially with the early pedals, they were all illustrations. And that was one of the keys for me wanting to do the book. I wanted you to actually see what they looked like. And that's what the book really deals details. And that's why I have all the images up till 1969 ish. That's when everything was photographs. And I just, I dropped off there. Wow. That's fascinating. I never really thought about that because I've seen in other old catalogs where you go like, now they're very realistic illustrations. Oh, they are. Very detailed, almost like photo realistic or like a patent, like a very realistic drawing. But that's a neat job. I wonder who did that. I'm sure they had to hire someone out to do these amazing illustrations. Well, me being a designer, and I started out that way, that there was zillions of designers out there. You just sat there with a pen and a paper and you drew it. That's it for all your products until you got to a certain point, it got into the computer age. Now you don't know what somebody drew or not. Yeah. Yeah, it's hard to tell, but you don't see that anymore. You don't even really see drum catalogs anymore. It's all online. It's all a products page on a website, which there's nothing wrong with it. I mean, you can't possibly think that there's, it takes a lot of money to put together a catalog. You know, that's probably not worth it. And me being in the publishing industry, I want to have it in my hand and I'll never let that go. I know everything's online, but that's why I put it in print and that's why I published it. I wanted it in your hand. Absolutely. And if people want it in their hand, can you say your email one more time or where you want people to text you? I just think it's good to, you know, as we wrap up where people can contact you to get a copy of this book. Sazamanic1athotmail.com Cool. I will link to that in the show notes so people can quickly get to it. But again, it's Z-E-M-A-N-E-K. And the book is the Ludwig line bass drum pedals. We're going to have a couple counts. Yes. Excellent. So, all right. Well, Steve, we'll hang out for a second and we're going to do a little Patreon bonus chat in five or 15 minutes. But this has been great and it's been an honor to have you on the show. Again, thank you to Vincent for connecting us and thanks for sharing your knowledge with us. I mean, this was a very fun, just a blast of an episode. I think I had more fun than you did. Thank you. If you like this podcast, find me on social media at drumhistory and please share, rate and leave a review. And let me know topics that you would like to learn about in the future. Until next time, keep on learning.