Being a "lefty" myself, I couldn't agree more, Ploughman. However, it was a little tough trying to convince those nuns in my grade school of that (lol). Do you think that's what we've got here?

In 1966, I did a good part of first grade (my rural school did not have kindergarten) with one hand tied behind my back. It wasn't because it was just so easy.

If the drums are swapped position, its right (hehehe).

There were folks who bought sets with reverse order intentionally, such as the left-handed (not sign of the devil) types, and there were also folks who bought them that way for the sake of pitch - I used to have a photo of Bernard Purdie on a black set of Rogers drums with the the toms set up that way where the toms did not decline in pitch as we are used to seeing. Of course, it wasn't beyond Rogers to issue them that way either. Every now and then something came out of the shop that just wasn't like the rest.

Mike here's a couple pictures. 13" tom muffler has since been added. :o

Mike: Here's a pic of the toms that the current owner just sent me. The labels on the shells are Dayton Holidays, serial numbers 80979 and 95439.

I can see one errant lug there?

Don't the Big R kits have the badges facing the drummer? Just a Rogers thing maybe?

Old School: Seems like this kit in question poses more questions than answers. Those Holiday serial numbers should date the toms to 1967, but that style of double tom holder pictured (dog-bone) transitioned out when the "Top Hat" kit became the "Londoner" in 1967. The bass drum, if it is also a 1967, should have the later Swivo double holder, not the earlier "Top Hat" dog-bone. Of course, there are exceptions to every rule, because I'm sure Rogers used up all the old hardware rather than sending it to the dumpster, and if they already had a matching bass with the old tom holder installed, it could have easily been paired up with those 1967 toms.

Now as far as the curious positioning of script badges goes, I think Amosguy's beautiful twin 12" Top Hat kit proves that Rogers placed badges on either the left or right panels depending upon the kit which they were designed for, and since the Top Hat could be ordered with two 13" toms, it's perfectly understandable to find single badges on either left or right panels on both the 12" and 13" tom. Glenn's Cleveland kit shows that the badges during that era were placed two panels from the collet, and my Fullertons show that Rogers finally smartened up and placed two badges on each tom, ensuring visibility to the audience.

I think the workers in that small Covington shop would have been quite amused if they knew that 60 years later such scholarly research would be dedicated to how they were tacking badges onto tom shells. :D

Mike

Appreciate your thoughts, Mike. I know that the current owner mentioned that the bass drum also has a Dayton label. I'm not sure about the serial number. Another "unique" thing is that one of the two tom "arms" that go into the mount is hexagonal on one end, yet rounded on the other, which makes no sense to me. I have no idea how you could tighten the tom properly to the collet with that set-up. I think I'd need to replace that arm (assuming I could find one at a reasonable price) with one that's hexagonal on both ends.

Despite all this "weirdness", the kit is in great shape with no extra holes or other modifications that I can see and the wrap looks much better in person that in the pic I posted. It's extremely clean. The current owner, who I've dealt with in the past, has offered it to me for $600, plus he'd be throwing in a "free" Ludwig snare. It seems like a pretty nice deal.

Here's the photo of Bernard Purdie with toms laid out as 13 then 12. I don't see the tone controls, so these drums may be from the Fullerton era when the toms had two scripts and the tone control was opposite the tom mount. But I have also had toms like the one shown on FFR28's, but they came that way from the factory. On the red onyx set, you cannot see the tone control, but it is in the next panel after the script, so it's just a bit out of sight and is opposite the tom mount. This places the script in a bit of an unusual position, but also reveals the wrap seam more than in cases where mount, script and tone control are in consecutive panels.