The Hammond/Lesie Hit or Miss thread!

[Outkaster]

I was interested to hear about stories some of you had about finding Hammond or Leslies or even missing them? I have a few:

 

1. Found a Leslie on the side of the road from a funeral home. Forgot about it and it was gone the next day.

2. Saw a M-102 on the side of the road last month and had gear with me. I could not move it or take it with me.

3. Found a 1966 Lesie 145 with a Hammond Colonade organ. Got it for $380.00. The guy asked if I was getting a good deal, I lied and said no. My buddy and me packed it up and sped away.

4. Got a 22H Leslie not working for $100.00. Stripped and sold the parts for a $700.00 profit.

[Doc Tonewheel]

My first Leslie. An excellent condition, fully functioning 147 with a Trek pedal, that I bought at Red Bank Music, NJ for $75 and drove home down the Garden State parkway with it in the back of my Plymouth Pacer. I miss the days when people were selling all their good stuff to buy a DX-7 at above the retail price.

[eric]

Here is a quick history of the Hammonds and Leslies I remember:

 

1) Hammond A-101 (still have it). This belonged to the church in which I grew up and I got a call from the organist when I was a freshman in college (circa 1988) letting me know they were getting rid of it and did I want it for $400? I had no place to keep it, but talked my mom into keeping it at her house for a few years until I could take it. Nice deal, though the bench was misplaced at the church and so I never got that.

 

2) Hammond M3. I bought this in 1989 for $200 out of the classified ads. This went directly onto my band's equipment truck for gigs and studio work. I had it modified slightly to work with the 1/4" preamp pedal in my next acquisition...

 

3) Leslie 145. I bought this right after getting the M3 in 1989 for $300 out of the classified ads as well. This came with a Leslie preamp pedal and was a nice Leslie. Went very well with the M3.

 

4) Leslie 122. I bought this in 2000 from an internet listing. It was my birthday present to myself that year and I actually drove 4 hours up to Maryland to fetch it. $800 for a living room condition unit with an extra 15" JBL speaker as well. I still have this Leslie.

 

5) Chopped 147. I bought this as a road Leslie in about 2002 from a guy that made road cases for me. It was $450. Painted black, pretty beat up, but worked really well. I used it for a few years and sold it to a friend. I think it is still around town someplace.

 

I think that's all of them!

[Outkaster]

Or how about this kind of stuff:

1. You drive past the side of the road and notice something tall and brown but then you pull over and you see that all it is is a bookshelf or a dresser. WTF?

 

2. You find out that a church is getting rid of a Hammond and Leslie. You get there and find out the only way you can take the Leslie is if you take the organ also and it ends up not being a Hammond but a Wurlitzer or Thomas brand organ.

 

3. You see a an ad in craigslist and contact the seller only to realize the mint B-3 that was listed was just sold for $300.00 to another person.

 

 

 

 

 

[mate stubb]

Sweet '59 oak C-3 and matching PR-40 dug out from under a matress at a furniture reupholstry shop in Columbus Ohio. $500, stock and untouched, and the best sounding Hammond I have ever known.

 

Her name is Cathy.

 

http://www.hotrodmotm.com/images/hammond/mansionstudio2.jpg

[MidLifeCrisis]

Bought a mint B3 for $300 once. There was an ad in the local classified for a Hammond 12AX7. I knew immediately that someone who knew nothing had opened the back and wrote down the first number he saw.

 

Traded a Rhodes for an M3 and a 900 Leslie with pre-amp.

 

Only bad move I ever made was trading a 57 Telecaster for a 122 Leslie. The Leslie was sweet but the Tele would be worth a fortune today

 

[Outkaster]

Sweet '59 oak C-3 and matching PR-40 dug out from under a matress at a furniture reupholstry shop in Columbus Ohio. $500, stock and untouched, and the best sounding Hammond I have ever known.

 

Her name is Cathy.

 

http://www.hotrodmotm.com/images/hammond/mansionstudio2.jpg

 

It thought you had an RT-3 once?

[yannis D]

1. Found a Leslie on the side of the road from a funeral home. .

 

Where's your road agai? Cause here in Europe a found hammond is as rare as a UFO. And very expenssive to buy If you're lucky enouph to find a seller

 

[Joe Muscara]

See, over here, UFOs aren't so rare. If you think about the kinds of people that would put a Hammond or Leslie out to the curb and the kinds of people who see UFOs, it all starts to make sense.

[yannis D]

See, over here, UFOs aren't so rare. If you think about the kinds of people that would put a Hammond or Leslie out to the curb and the kinds of people who see UFOs, it all starts to make sense.

 

i love th :thu:is country

[Tonysounds]

My first leslie was a 147 I bought for $100; it had been modified to take a 1/4 input and came with the bottom half of a flight case (the wheel tray). It allegedly was stolen from the Patti Smith group in the 70s and was in the basement of a bar until I bought it in '84. Didn't need a preamp: it had an "on" switch and a power cable, had the original 147 amp that could take the multi pin or 1/4. You could plug a guitar directly in, or an amplifier. I used my TOA mixer amp and plugged into that leslie and it screamed. Furniture was in nice condition too.

[mate stubb]

It thought you had an RT-3 once?

 

Although I've played RTs many times, all I have ever owned is a '54 B-2, '59 C-3 (Cathy), '58 B-3 chop, and Charlene, my '56 B-3.

[Jode]

A friend of mine scored a minty-fresh 1952 BV with Leslie (122?), matching bench, and locking top-cover intact, all in dusted-with-Pledge-once-a-week-for-fifty-years condition, at a thrift store for $150.

 

My M3 was scored from an organ store that wanted fifty bucks to make it disappear.

[HammondDave]

Although not all great deals, most of my Hammond aquisitions were, "interesting".

 

1. Bought my first B3 from a guy in Dallas who drove to So Cal to pick up some cheap Hammonds and resell them at a profit. Unfortunately the IRS was after him and he sold me his mint 1963 B3 with a matching 122 for $2700 cash. I resold that organ ten years later for around $6000. I kept the Leslie.

 

2. My second B3 was a 1961 fruitwood B3, a former church organ. When I went to the elder's home who had it stored I discovered that it would not turn on. I bought it for $400. All worked fine after I changed out the tubes. I still have that organ.

 

3. My third B3 was purchased the day after the one mentioned above. A tech called me and asked if I purchased the church organ. I told him that I did. He said "too bad" as he was on a service call for a 1955 mint B3 and 22H Leslie that was being sold in an Beverly Hills estate sale. I called the auction house and purchased that pair for $700. I still own this organ.

 

4. After a few months another tech called me and said that he just serviced a very nice 1956 B3 from an old woman's home and she wanted to sell it. I told her that I would help her sell it on Ebay, but she was not interested in that. I told her that she probably could get around $3500 for it (was sunbleached on one side and was missing the serial plate). She offered to sell it to me for $2700. The most I ever paid for a B3. I later resold this organ to a recording studio where they could care less about the sun-bleaching or missing plate.

 

5. From the Hammond E-mail list someone posted another church organ that was located close to Palm Springs. My wife and I hopped in the car "just to look at it". Really, I was not going to buy it as I already had three B3's and I promised my wife that three was the limit. Anyway when we drove up to the house the garage door was open and I could see that it was another fruitwood organ (1959). I purchased it for $1800. To make room for it I sold the 1956 organ listed above.

 

Pictures of all these organs are located here: http://www.csulb.edu/~djacques/page_davids_keyboard_collection.htm

 

So now three beautiful B3's along with six leslies reside in my home. If I had the room there would be five living there. If you are looking for a Hammond, your local tech is definately your best source.

 

By the way, I got a call last week from a seller in Madison of a beautiful fruitwood B3 and Leslie. It is fairly priced (around $7000), but the shipping would kill me. Contact me if you want the lead.

[Outkaster]

A friend of mine scored a minty-fresh 1952 BV with Leslie (122?), matching bench, and locking top-cover intact, all in dusted-with-Pledge-once-a-week-for-fifty-years condition, at a thrift store for $150.

 

My M3 was scored from an organ store that wanted fifty bucks to make it disappear.

 

It is always seems that someone else that gets those deals.

[Moonglow]

I once had a chopped Hammond B-V with added percussion, and a "custom" Leslie (122 cabinet, I believe). While the chop job was very nice, both were dogs! A local tech once looked inside the Hammond and said it was a "toilet" in terms of the mismatched components. But I was very young (19) and really didn't know any better. I got tired of lugging it around after about one year, and unable to sell it, ended up donating it to a local church.

 

 

[ArnoldLayne]

I swore I'd never tell this story...I hope no one holds it against me.

 

Back in 1981 I was in high school (metro Detroit area) and some fellow classmates (musicians) were telling me about their escapades exploring the old closed down sanitarium, Eloise (www.talesofeloise.com ...if you dare). They told me there was an old theater on the grounds and in the theater was an old organ. They told me this because they knew I was a keyboard player.

 

One day we skipped class and they took me there. October 30th to be exact. We drove into the area from the Wayne County General Hospital parking lot since wrought iron gates surrounded the front along Michigan Avenue. In case anyone is unaware of the histroy behind Eloise, I'm telling you, this place was creeeeeepy.

 

We went into the old theater. It was incredible. Balcony, orchestra pit, stage...plaster from the ceilings had fallen in and covered everything.

 

First we went down stairs. Fallout shelter signs everywhere. 2 flights down we came across caged in areas with medical supplies that people had broken into. It was rumored that morphine was looted from them years ago. 2 more flights of stairs and we came to the tunnels. It had been talked about for years that there tunnels all through westland and wayne and the whole area connecting city and school buildings in case of nuclear attacks. We opened a door and stood there staring straight into one!

 

Anyways, back upstairs down the main aisle of the theater we walked down to the orchestra pit. I saw it sitting there and flipped. My memory fails me as to the exact model...I thought it was a CV but this had 2 tone generators so I'm not certain which model this made it, but it was a Hammond. I brushed all the plaster and cobwebs from it and it was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen.

 

That night I went to practive and told my bandmates. On Devils Night in 1981 we loaded into the guitar players van and drove to Eloise and rescued that lil' sumbitch.

 

That night we chopped it and the next day it looked like this:

http://img127.imagevenue.com/loc822/th_21197_Hammond_Chop_122_822lo.jpg

 

I held onto it for as long as I could. Lost my leslie first (not from Eloise, there was a tone cabinet and pedals but we didn't save them)...couldn't haul it anymore and left it in a practice studio in Brighton. Guitar player called me up and said a keyboard player was interested in it so I gave it to him.

 

About 1987 I did record some songs with producer Jack Douglas who worked a lexicon leslie simulation while a layed tracks so it did get recorded. I couldn't move it from the studio so I gave it to the sound engineer there.

 

I'll never forget Eloise or that organ. About 12 years ago they flattened the whole block where Eloise sat for 150 years. MacDonalds and a strip mall...wtf?

 

Arnold

[loumi]

Back in 1981 I was in high school (metro Detroit area)...

 

Dang, I knew I shouldn't have moved from Michigan in 1980!!

 

and some fellow classmates (musicians) were telling me about their escapades exploring the old closed down sanitarium, Eloise

 

Oh man, you went THERE?!!!

 

2 more flights of stairs and we came to the tunnels. It had been talked about for years that there tunnels all through westland and wayne and the whole area connecting city and school buildings in case of nuclear attacks.

 

Did you find Jimmy Hoffa? I lived in the area he disappeared from. But I didn't do it - HONEST!!!

 

Arnold, your story is so good, it should go into the Detroit rock-n-roll hall of fame (if there was one). You told it so well, I felt like I was there, but glad I was not.

 

Lou

 

[kanker.]

On Devils Night in 1981 we loaded into the guitar players van and drove to Eloise and rescued that lil' sumbitch.

 

That night we chopped

Rescuing it to chop it?!?! Oxymoron anyone?

[DirtyRubberDuck]

Arnold,

 

You got that baby right before I moved to Detroit, awesome story!

 

DRD