My Dumpster Diving Neighbor

BobC

BobC

Silver Member
For decades, we have lived next door to a couple, Kevin and Sue, who we have always gotten along with. We're lucky to have good neighbors on both sides. Kevin tends our garden and we share the vegetables.

Kevin is a picker, a dumpster diver. Tonight, he showed up at the door holding a nearly perfect Yamaha double bass pedal. He had the back of his pickup truck almost loaded with more drum gear he had fished out of a dumpster down the street. It's pretty much all low end stuff; a student model Ludwig snare, light duty hi-hat stands, cymbal stands, a throne, two snare stands, a single bass pedal, tom arms, floor tom legs, Zildjian ZBT and other low end cymbals, a Dr. Beat, drum books, an instruction CD, a 16" reso tom head and assorted other pieces of hardware, like a hi-hat clutch and drum keys, plus slightly mildewed carrying bags for the pedals and snare.

I've already decided to donate most of it to a local school for the music department, but I can flip the cymbals and snare drum locally. I'll keep the Dr. Beat and the Yamaha double pedal.

Kevin couldn't understand why anyone would just throw away all this stuff. Neither can I. Apparently, the husband walked out on the wife and two little kids, the house went up for sale, and whoever is buying the house came in and started tossing stuff out.

Check out the photo. This isn't the first time Kevin has found drum gear for me. Years ago, he showed up with a white marine pearl MIJ 60's snare that I still have. He found it in a trash pile. I have yet to restore it.

I keep hoping he'll show up one day with a Gladstone or old Leedy snare. Maybe a set of Rogers in Mardi Gras Pearl!
 

Attachments

  • Dumpster Haul 2.jpg
    Dumpster Haul 2.jpg
    160.8 KB · Views: 111
Man that is crazy! Nice score. I try to look in any dumpsters I happen upon, looking for wire or copper pipe. Never seen any drum stuff.
 
The rest of the drumset is still in the dumpster! Kevin didn't want to pull it out for some reason, but I'll go have a look tomorrow. If it's just dirty, I'll try to rescue it, clean it up and give it to a kid.
 
man, I have 3 seperate drum sets at school that were saved from the trash!! I also lend them out to families who can't afford one, or who want to "test the waters" before diving in with their own money. They were all found in the alleys behind houses on Ohio States campus...
 
Xstr8edgtnrdrmrX said:
man, I have 3 seperate drum sets at school that were saved from the trash!! I also lend them out to families who can't afford one, or who want to "test the waters" before diving in with their own money. They were all found in the alleys behind houses on Ohio States campus...
Click to expand...
Lending the drums out is a real good idea. I never thought of that. How do you qualify them, and how would you keep from getting ripped off?
 
BobC said:
I've already decided to donate most of it to a local school for the music department, but I can flip the cymbals and snare drum locally. I'll keep the Dr. Beat and the Yamaha double pedal.
Click to expand...
Those "Flying Dragon" pedals are killer (y) Cool that you're donating the majority of the find. (y)
 
BobC said:
Lending the drums out is a real good idea. I never thought of that. How do you qualify them, and how would you keep from getting ripped off?
Click to expand...

it is first come, first serve
they get a month with each set
all of the kids usually have taken privately from me for a year before drum set playing comes up
and i go to the house to help them set up the first time, so I litteraly "know where they live"
 
I dumped a pile of clarinets and flutes in a dumpster that had been basement flooded. It was from a closing music store.
Several people were browsing it within an hour. I shoulda grabbed the wooden clarinets, tho they did give me some assorted pieces before trashing all.
 
BruceW said:
I have a good friend who is a drummer, and he manages to find lots of drum gear at his local town dump. (Rural area) Always amazes me...
Click to expand...
I went to our local county dump years agom to get rid of household junk, just as a big dump truck was pulling away from the dumpsters. On top of the truck was a full set of drums, low end, of course. I quickly asked one of the workers if he could call the truck back so I could grab the drums, but he was not cooperative. They were going in the landfill. What a shame, I thought. I could have donated them to a music school, or a kid who wanted a set.
 
Jerry Jenkins got started with FG drums, when his son spotted a 7-8 piece Blaemire Set.....in a dumpster.
They had no idea....at the time...what kind they were. They saved them.....at first just for the hardware...
 
The mojo is great with this one. Get the rest of the drum kit as soon as possible.
 
Over the past few years we purchased land, cleaned it up and scrapped thousands of pounds of junk. Whenever you buy land that had an old cabin or homestead on it, you'll always find junk. Every time I visit the scrap yard I see things sticking out of the pile that I wouldn't have thrown out.

The only "junk" I'm keeping right now are things that I find on my property that have some historical value. Examples include various pieces of rail road iron dating back to the late 1800's, rusty tools from the early 1900's and some whiskey bottles from the 1940's and 50's. Everything else gets burned, thrown out or scrapped.
 
Here's to sharp-eyed neighbors!

A few years ago, one of my neighbors spotted a 10" tom being thrown out by college kids and brought it me. By chance it was a Ludwig with the same lugs as my Classic Birch kit, but was poplar shell, missing the bottom hoop, and wrapped in blue sparkle. It was a good opportunity to try my hand at re-wrapping a shell. I bought a new hoop and gold sparkle wrap to match my kit.

My edgework isn't so great, but the drum tunes up fine and blends well enough with the other drums to use it if I want.
20231002_064354.jpg
 
I got my set of 40's era Zildjinas out of a "trash pick" that also yeilded an old Rogers drum set. The ladies husband had died back in the 70's, and she lived on for another 20 years, with all of his "drum junk" in the basement. when the family sold the house to move her to assisted living, they put a bunch of musical stuff at the curb.

Their neighbor was a family whose daughter was takign lessons from me. The dad grabbed all of the drum stuff for her to use. This was pre cel lphone days, so he called me on the regular phone and explained what it was. I said GRAB IT NOW!!! Before it gets wet.

When she graduated from HS, she didn't want to use the kit anymore, so they just gave it to me!!! I kept the cymbals, and gave the kit to my best friend, who is a drummer - whose last name happens to be Rogers - and that started his adventure in vintage kit collecting. I already had dads 55 Ludwigs, and at the time, no room for another kit.
 
Jeremy Bender said:
I don't know what's sadder...drum gear winding up in a dumpster or a family crumbling.

Either way, props to you for donating things to a school.
Click to expand...
My thoughts exactly. :cry:
Both are sad no matter the condition of the people or gear.
 
Update: Kevin and I drove around the corner to revisit the dumpster and to our disappointment, it was gone. Someone came and hauled it away early this morning, so that's that. I decided to sell the double pedal, and it's already up on FB Marketplace and Drum Sellers. CL is next later tonight. I figured I really didn't have a need for it after all, so I might as well make some money. I'll clean up the snare and sell that too.
 
In my life I've never even had anyone show me so much as a drum key they found and I'm reading all of these dumpster finds. It's like a music store got robbed and the stuff was dumped by the guys that were being chased by the cops. Damn..id just like to find a pair of 5Bs that someone tossed.
 
Bozozoid said:
In my life I've never even had anyone show me so much as a drum key they found and I'm reading all of these dumpster finds. It's like a music store got robbed and the stuff was dumped by the guys that were being chased by the cops. Damn..id just like to find a pair of 5Bs that someone tossed.
Click to expand...

I feel the same way when I read about all of these people who find stashes of old sports cards in mint condition, and worth millions....why has that never happened to me?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top