JW Pepper Euphonium Info Requested

[RandyK]

Greetings All! New to this forum and was hoping to gather some information about a Euphonium I recently acquired.... Here is what I know...

The horn is silver in color - somewhat tarnished now with very few "dings" (surprisingly), with the following engraved inscriptions:

J. W. Pepper and Sons
Philadelphia
52538
Exchanged for New Buescher.
Elkhart Indiana
9111


I am looking for a possible manufacturer date (I am guessing between 1877 & 1909 from what I can tell). It did come with a mouthpiece - but I cannot tell if that part is newer or older...



Any information (age, value, history, etc...) would really be appreciated!

Thanks!

[bbocaner]

1st, it's not a euphonium, it's a Bb tenorhorn. Which is similar to what we'd call a baritone in today's nomenclature.

This style of instrument showed up from many manufacturers late 1890s and went through to around 1920, perhaps a little later. But bands stopped using the tenorhorn in that time period so they became less and less common as time went on.

Philadelphia denotes it'll be after they moved from Chicago, in 1890.

JW Pepper and SONS (as opposed to just JW Pepper) engraved on an instrument suggests that it was made after 1910.

Compare to the serial number list here, it appears yours is one of the first where & Sons appeared in the engraving. So that'd pretty much guarantee your year of manufacture would be 1910 precisely.

http://www.horn-u-copia.net/Pepper/Pepperlist.php

The "exchanged for new buescher" engraving is weird. Did Buescher run a trade-in promotion and then brand all the instruments they received as some sort of advertisement? This person seems to think so:

http://forum.saxontheweb.net/showthr...-Buescher-quot

[bbocaner]

Actually, looking at the photo, it might be an Eb alto horn. Hard to tell. Do you play? It looks to be in really nice shape, but there really isn't much of a market for instruments of this era at all. I'd estimate the value to be somewhere in the $150-$300 range, but you may have difficulty finding a buyer. There *may* be some collectible value due to the unusual Buescher engraving, but it's not going to be dramatic. It likely is also designed to play at high pitch, making it unusable with modern ensembles.