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Rollmonica
By Ed Schmidt

After going over all of the back digest, I found several inquiries about the
Rollmonica.

I am familiar with three different models that appeared over the years.
Starting back in 1928 the Rolmonica was manufactured by the Rollmonica Music
Co. of Baltimore MD.  There were two models.  The standard Rollmonica was a
12 note instrument and used 3 1/4" wide rolls.  The Chromatic Rollmonica was
a 16 note instrument and used a roll approximately 3.7" wide.  Both rolls
were of 2 mil dry waxed paper.  In the 40s or 50s a plastic version of the
Rollmonica appeared.  

A number of people have asked me to cut rolls for the instruments,  but
several problems have held me back.  First, my source of dry waxed paper
will only supply me 2 mill paper in roll form if I buy 1000 pounds.  There
is no way in my lifetime that I could use that much 2 mill paper. Does
anyone know of a supplier that works in smaller quantities?  The second and
more major problem  is the spools that are used in the instruments.  They
are made from several different metal stampings.  I have not found anyone
who would do the tooling and stampings in the quantities that would be
needed by collectors, at an affordable price.  Copying the old songs and
punching them is no problem.



(Message sent Thu, 14 Dec 1995 10:08:28 -0500 , from time zone -0500.)

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