joel hooks1

Comment by Paul Draper on May 7, 2019 at 10:11am

What do you have there, Rob?

Comment by Rob Morrison on May 7, 2019 at 10:50am

Hey Paul--I found this on the Elderly site one night around 1:00 in the morning and had bought it by 1:05.  It's a Boucher style banjo almost identical to the one Bob Winans donated to the new African American History Smithsonian museum.  It was, as I suspected, unplayable due to shrinkage of the wood after 160-odd years, but luckily I am friends with John Pringle, a really talented luthier and viol maker who guided me through the process of resetting the neck without altering the integrity of the banjo.  All the finished and hardware are original, it's in excellent condition, and plays like a dream.  The photos are from before the work on the neck.  I also had to mount a new head.  

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