Lyon & Healy Serial Numbers

[Dan Schultz]

Anyone know of a list? I have a euph... serial number 4502.

[Chuck(G)]

Dan, a good question--and one that the sax community would probably kill to have an answer to.

I've got an Eb tuba with S/N 10379 "American Professional". I'd guess maybe 1920 or so and probably French import.

L&H, aside from a period right around 1900, did mostly nothing but stencil stuff. Not all of it was good, and not all was terrible. Conn, King, Buescher, Martin and Holton all made instruments for L&H; a bunch more was imported. It's a grand mess.

[Dan Schultz]

Dan, a good question--and one that the sax community would probably kill to have an answer to...... It's a grand mess.

The one in my shop is identical to the two euphs pictured on the Horn-U-Copia website. The only clue I have as to age is the serial number and the fact that the waterkey has a flat spring. I understand that the flat spring usually indicates 1900 or earlier.

[Lew]

The problem with Lyon & Healy brasses is that, as Chuck mentioned, the majority of their instruments were made by someone else. I do have a Lyon & Healy catalog/magazine that purports to show their manufacturing facilities making their "own make" and "improved own make" instruments from 1917. They claim to have made brass instruments from the 1890s. I don't think anyone has done a comprehensive study of their instruments, and I suspect that serial numbers were not consistent anyway due to so many coming from either other US makers or from Europe.

Sounds like a good topic for a musicology dissertation.

[Chuck(G)]

The other facet of this is that you have to understand that L&H was almost exclusively a mail-order outfit. They did make their own harps for quite awhile (I remember visiting their downtown Chicago showroom), but I suspect that even the "Own Make" labeled brass was made by someone else.