Re: [Harp-L] Theory, etc. - history of positions

[Frank Evers <frank@xxxxxxxxx>]

Am Freitag, 23. Februar 2007 15:52 schrieb David Coulson:
> In Winslow's  response to Iceman's posting he states that the
> popular image of harmonica playing in the Civil War was the
> creation of Hollywood screen writers, and that harmonica production
> was too low until the 1870s or 1880s for the instrument to have
> been widespread. However, in the Alan Bates collection site he
> links to in the same response, it says this: "First imported in
> quantity in the early 1860s, they (harmonicas) became popular with
> soldiers from both north and south.  Many harmonica remains have
> been found around Civil War camp sites."
> So which is correct?

Hohner (which was afaik the first company to export harmonicas to 
America) started regular exports in 1865. According to Klaus Rohwer´s 
website (http://www.klausrohwer.de/privat/hobbies/muha/geschi.htm) 
Hohners whole production in 1867 was 22000 harmonicas.
Even if most of them were shipped overseas that´d probably not enough 
to to equip whole armies.
Actually they had their market in europe too, so think it was in fact 
only a smaller fraction of their production that was exported.

However i have no idea if any harmonicas were produced within America 
at that time.

-- 
Gruß,Frank