A Brief History of the Salmons Family Markneukirchen Violin

Being an example of the personal storytelling that can flow from the “Diaspora” companion project for the proposed Markneukirchen #LTM (Local Time Machine) Project

Timlynn Babitsky and I believe that the proposed Markneukirchen #LTM project could be a showcase example of how the #SmartTourism dimension of the @TimeMachineEU Roadmaps plan could contribute a “win-win” to local communities where cultural preservation and tourism meet in the 21st Century. As a supplement to our article, The Markneukirchen Local Time Machine (#LTM) & the @ICScohort’s Musical Instrument Diaspora Identification (#MIDI) Companion Project, this piece is a sampling of the kind of personal storytelling can provide additional and uniquely individual provenance data to a Time Machine Project.

Episode #1

My first childhood memory of the Salmons family Markneukirchen violin happened well before I had the desire to be a musician. My Dad, having grown from a horse-drawn farming Country Boy into a college-educated City Slicker, was working as a “human computer” before the entry into the business ecosystem of the digital kind. Having shed his Country roots, the violin was tied with twine to hang under the water pipes that ran through his basement walk-in tool closet.

Intrigued by the incredible walrus-hide hard-shell case that obviously held a violin inside, I had to wait a number of years before the step-stool in Dad’s tool closet and my growing reach enabled me to slip the case from its twine-based noose so I could have my long-desired first glimpse of the violin itself…

And, oh my, what a shock to the system of my impressionable and imaginative youth.

The violin was a mess. There were a few grain-splits along the edges just on the top-piece alone. The worst was a gaping two-level split in the wood running from f-hole to bottom edge of what had obviously been a once-beautiful instrument.

To add insult to injury in this instrument’s Karmic Journal, carelessly non-wiped bow rosin had literally eaten so much of the top-piece finish that you had to squint and imagine what this violin must have looked like “in its day.” Had I then been a better-informed inspector, I would have also been able to add a non-trivial list of significant though thankfully-repairable issues with this instrument which would be revealed to me some twenty-five or so years later.

Dejected as this was not the undiscovered Stradivarius I had hoped for, but now better informed, I returned the violin to its case and carefully reinserted the case into its twine-noose loops such that I was sure my eagle-eyed Father would not detect my transgression.

Episode #2

Collapsing a lot of personal ebbs and flows along the way, by the time I was in college and had entered the “real world” of adult employment, etc., if I wasn’t “working” I was playing music on stringed instruments of all kinds in multiple genres. I was a pure “autonomic muscle memory” musician. If I heard and saw it done, I could imitate and imprint it into my playing ability.

While working in downtown Baltimore after college in the late 1970s and early 80s, I had an opportunity to take an open-audition at the Peabody Conservatory of Music (at that time famous and independent, now the Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University). There was a weekend program for non-degree adults. Although a non-terminal program, admission was none the less rigorous. I auditioned on guitar but requested entry to study violin. And it was almost literally a heart-stopping moment when they informed me that I could enroll in the program.

With this critical opportunity in my “back-pocket,” I met with Dad and asked him if he would grant me the possession of the family violin so I could take lessons at Peabody. He was surprised at my request and quickly agreed. And we went down to the basement where he took down the family violin and did what #cidocCRM curators would log as a Transfer of Custody event.

Episode #3

When I met with my prospective teacher at Peabody and showed her the violin I wanted to use for my lessons, she saw quality and knew enough to send me on a driving day-trip North to take our family violin to Edward C. Campbell at the Chimneys Violin Shop in Boiling Springs, Pennsylvania. Per Internet and all its digital wonderment, back then I had the scribbled name of the shop, Campbell’s name, and a long-distance phone number to make the repair arrangement. A quick phone call informed me that Master Violin-maker Edward Campbell did a first-come, first-served “repair diagnosis” session each Saturday morning at the shop in Boiling Springs.

After the long morning drive, I joined other “expectant possessors” of what we hoped to be instruments destined for a new lease on life at the hands of a renowned American violin-maker Edward Campbell. Having arrived somewhat late to the session, I watched one-by-one as folks like me stepped up to have Master Campbell consider repairing their long-treasured family instrument… And one-by-one Edward Campbell delivered the equivalent of good bedside manner as he gently told folks that, “No, I cannot fix your instruments. And if you want to do young Billy or Jane a favor as they begin their musical studies, please put this instrument on a high shelf and rent or buy them an affordable modern instrument that will be playable.

When my time in the crucible happened, I had braced for the worst. But upon placing my case on the examination table, the first words Master Campbell said was something to the effect of, “Well, even if the violin inside is worthless, this antique walrus-ride case is rare and worth a good price on today’s market… let’s see what is inside.”

Upon opening, he did a subtle double-take and said something along the lines of, “Well, I know it is not what it looks like which is the King Joseph violin by Guarnieri… but it is a very good copy. Let’s take a closer look at the labels.” And that is when Master Campbell invited me into his area behind the small showroom/story. He went to a multi-volume set of the registry of members of the guild of violin-makers and, lo and behold, found that Hermann Geipel was indeed a Markneukirchen-known guild member in the late-19th Century!

It was obvious by my appearance that I was a “poor hippy” musician, but the fact that a trusted friend member of the Peabody faculty had sent me to him was enough for him to “do the right thing” and agree to repair the Salmons family Markneukirchen violin. The one thing he made sure I understood was that un-repaired, the instrument had historic artifact collector value. But the moment he took it apart in order to respectfully and completely repair and rebuild it, our violin would lose all its antique value and would, instead, be valued as a playable quality instrument. I agreed to the transformation, and it was many months before I found this notice and invoice in my apartment mailbox:

Given the many months that the Chimneys Violin Shop had my violin in hand for “reconstructive surgery,” the brief typewritten description of what they did for a trifling $64 USD is a candidate for the “work product understatement of the Century” award. That amount is about $238 by a USD 2019 inflation value adjustment. Even adjusted, this is an incredible gift that Master Campbell gave to me at the start of my Peabody experience.

Seriously, my jaw dropped and I had goosebumps when I drove back up to Boiling Springs to pick-up our family violin and heard Master Campbell proudly show and play the result of his meticulous repair and reconstruction.

Episode #4

The final “provenance memory” I have for this Markneukirchen #MIDI Diaspora story took place about two years later, in 1981, when I returned to Boiling Springs for a “tune up” to have pegs dressed, ribs closed etc., and picked us a shoulder rest and Dampit humidity-tube to take better care of my awesome instrument. By this point I was over my “adult non-degree” Peabody lessons and was playing music whenever I wasn’t working.

I am somewhat proud of the fact that I was provided a loaner instrument during the extended time when the Chimneys folks again repaired our beautiful Markneukirchen violin.

Episode #5

As many folks know, Timlynn Babitsky and I are post-cancer #PayItForward Bonus Round indie #CitizenScientists. Let me wrap up this “sample” Markneukirchen #LTM/#MIDI Diaspora reflection by making the #Nowsliding connection between the episodic stories I told above and the genesis of the idea to suggest that Markneukirchen be considered for an #LTM Local Time Machine project.

As I resurfaced to “the Living” from my horrific cancer battle where I spent several months as a pre-verbal delusional child, two “must-do” action items reverberated with my wife and fellow cancer-survivor Timlynn Babitsky and me:

• we would “do something” amazing to preserve and draw attention to the incredible historic story of the Dawn of the Microcomputer and Digital Age that is captured in the 48-issues of Softalk magazine, and
• on a personal level, I felt an intense need to find “next homes” for the many stringed musical instruments that I still owned but was unable to play due to tunnel carpel issues and, well, just being lucky to be alive much less capable of again playing music.

So the “rabbit hole” of the incredible technical challenges of the digitization of modern topical magazine document collections drew us in. But in parallel to this developing interest, I felt the need to begin the thoughtful process of finding homes for the my various musical instruments.

I have captured that Life Experience in another Medium story entitled “Ode to Odell” which I invite and encourage you to read. (The opening section is particularly relevant as it captures how I feel about “ownership” vis a vis “stewardship” of the Karmic Life of musical instruments.)

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