(Holders of back issues of our former bassoon newsletter, "To The World's Bassoonists" should refer to Volume VI, No. 1, 1976, an issue devoted to the bassoon designing and making skills of R. W. MacGibbon. We are deeply saddened at the passing of this artist and friend.)
Though known to many IDRS members chiefly as a high grade woodwind repairman and builder of a small number of bassoons, there are numerous other points of interest in Mac's long career.
Born in Maine and early transplanted to New Hampshire, his youth was spent tolerating school and practicing the flute--his main instrument. He also spent considerable time at his father's place of work--the railroad machine shop. Here he acquired a thorough grounding in the field of the machinist.
In World War I he played flute and piccolo in the post band at Fort Adams, Newport, Rhode Island, and commuted to Boston to study with Arthur Brooke of the Boston Symphony.
During the 1920's he played in numerous theater orchestras in New England, eschewing work in Boston because that involved working seven days a week rather than six as elsewhere. He told me the normal playing schedule involved three shows a day, six days a week. Included were vaudeville, movie scores and the usual overtures, entr'acts, etc. Rehearsals occurred Monday mornings--if the train was on time. Otherwise, a talk-through and sight-reading of the show at the Monday matinee.
During the summer many houses didn't retain their orchestras, and Mac played a variety of band and orchestra jobs in resort areas. In spare time he began to hang around repair shops (on occasion the Haynes flute factory) and to do some repair work on his own.
With the coming of sound movies, the theater music folded suddenly, and Mac took a job in the Waltham Watch Factory as a machinist. During this period he also completed a course in dental technology. He never worked in this field, however, as a price war happened just as he became qualified to enter the business.
Disliking factory work, and with little chance to function as either a performer or dental technician, he chose to concentrate on an attempt at full-time woodwind repair. He and his wife landed in Milwaukee in 1931 to enter this field. Milwaukee was not a blind choice, as he had encountered members of an American Legion Band on tour from there and gained from them a favorable image of the city as a place to live and work.
1931 was not the greatest time to start a new business in a strange town. But by filling in with playing and a very little teaching he started to establish his place in the sun as a repairman. A daughter born in 1933 lent urgency to the project.
About 1935, now divorced and with time on his hands, he began to tool a bassoon. Though things were not tooled as if for factory use in production, a great deal of ingenuity and careful work went into these tools. With malice aforethought, they were made adjustable to the point they could be used to duplicate instruments of most manufacturers. This feature mandates a certain amount of care in their employment. The tools were made on worn-out machines to function on worn-out machines and to do work to very close tolerances--if one is careful. A century old Barnes lathe was adapted as a very usable copy lathe. And a set of centers applied to an ancient drill press provided a slightly fragile tone hole machine, adjustable in three dimensions.
I met Mac in 1951. By that time he had completed three bassoon bodies--sans keys. Since I had some acquaintance with this sort of thing, I volunteered to do the pattern keys--in spare time. Meanwhile Mac continued tooling: pad cups, posts, etc. The pattern keys were built on body No. 1, then removed, holes plugged, and sent to the foundry. In about 1957, No. 2 bassoon was completed using the new castings. (No. 1 was ultimately remounted, finished and sold.)
Mechanical innovations and body finish changes occurred with each instrument. Seven were completed. Projected key changes for No. 8 were in the hopper; i.e., long joint keys on pivots a la Artia. But this body, with its metal bell ferrule, will probably never be finished. The seven existing specimens were copied carefully from a good 5000 series Heckel built in 1914.
Anent the repair phase of Mac's career: he brought to the repair field many techniques and tools peculiar to dental and jewelry manufacture. He had limited contact with instrument factory practices until I joined him. His imagination and familiarity with mechanics and machine tools produced numerous tools for special jobs, often on specific instrument models. These tools, while not fancy, performed better than most commercially available counterparts. A great number of them aren't and never were available for sale. Mac's adjustable oboe vent remover is far better than any other to date. Other tools, such as the wood flute tools are essentially obsolete but will not be discarded.
Perhaps what set Mac apart was his attitude and approach to his field. He repaired so that an instrument could be used by a professional in his job. He started work during the depression when nearly every wreck had to be rebuilt. Stock parts weren't available so everything down to pivot screws had to be made. Missing key parts had to be sawed and contoured from raw stock. He was obsessed with the idea that his repair work should look like the original and not show signs of having been "fixed". He was very clever at padding and adjusting, but his forte was structural repair and improvement.
Whether or not he set out to be a "character" is uncertain. He preserved a rather thick New Hampshire accent through over forty years in Milwaukee--complete with local expressions, some unprintable. Choice examples follow:
"Anybody who repairs to the customer's standards is a crook."
To a customer with a hopeless case: "Jesus Christ with a gold screwdriver couldn't fix that wreck."
Notifying school band leaders of completed work, "Your debris is ready."
"I came from a county where it was a felony to be a Democrat."
"If you can't put it together without bending the keys, take up the bass drum!"
"Music should be played behind closed doors with the public excluded."
"The music business has very little to do with music. It's all about money and politics."
"The only way to play comfortably in front of a cornet player is to make him a solid lead pipe."
"He has a sound like pulling barbed wire through a key hole."
On hearing Elvis, "I'm happy to announce that music is headed up--it just struck bottom."
On modern music, "Those b----s get paid for playing all them wrong notes!"
Many of the more interesting comments won't go through the mail, even with today's standards.
Mac's work attire never varied: dungaree pants and a dark blue shirt with shop apron. Always a black tie with Masonic pin and visor work cap, sleeves rolled up and pinned so as not to catch in rotating machinery.
There are more "Mac" anecdotes around Milwaukee than space would permit, ranging from his feats as a performer to his skills as a repairman. He retired from most activity in 1972 to care for his second wife who was in failing health. After her passing in 1975, he moved to California near his daughter.
Daughter Bonnie saw to his wants until his health forced a move to a nursing facility and finally to the VA hospital for a final cadence.
His is survived by Bonnie and her two sons, and a brother and sister in the East.
I hope the above has not seemed to be a eulogy. As a man he had some faults--as a repairman, very few. I worked with Mac for a number of years and hope to carry on many of his principles--if with lesser skill. In this day of "Big" and "Conglomerates" it is reassuring to feel that the little guy might find a place and derive satisfaction from doing something useful for even a segment of the masses.
Double reed types can count many instances of true devotion. Mac is of this group.