Hi Matt,  I had six to eight employees/apprentices when operating
Pedals Pumpers & Rolls -- my business in the Chicago area -- and
I can appreciate your sentiments.  I have a 45-year history in
mechanical music restoration and am just now semi-retired and
finding someone not buried in electronica and willing to learn the
trade while earning a living.  His commitment is still not a sure
thing, but it's promising.

I am still traveling all over the Southeast doing restorations and
repairs and, at 78, I know the problem of future maintenance.  My
business of 35 years took me all over the country as well as a few
international trips from, as I said, the Chicago area, mostly to do
with reproducers, nickelodeons and orchestrions.  I claim the honor
of starting the Jasper Sanfilippo collection in 1975 with the sale of
his first, a Steinway XR Louis XV Duo-Art, and rebuilding his first
few nickelodeons.  My preference was to work for numbers of instrument
owners, not just one patron, so he found his own people after that.

Keep me in the loop.  I don't mind if you put my reply in the MMD (it
is all true!) and I'm still active in the restoration business.  To see
what I am still doing you may go to http://www.pedalspumpersrolls.com/ 

Roger Dayton - Pedals, Pumpers, and Rolls
Greenville, South Carolina
tel.: 1-864-238-2677
roger.dayton.ppr@gmail.com.geentroep [delete ".geentroep" to reply]