In 1907, he built an immensaphone, the largest horn in the world at 12 feet in diameter and 35 feet long. The Colonel loved strange and bizarre instruments. By 1893 his instruments were awarded the highest honors in the World’s Columbia Exposition in Chicago. The factory was rebuilt bigger and better and production continued. During his second term, he was forced to resign due to a factory fire in 1883. In 1880, the town of Elkhart, Indiana became so enamored with C.G. In that same year, Colonel Conn would build the first American made cornet.īy 1879, Conn moved operations into larger quarters and began making other instruments. After watching him work for a few days, Conn believed he could build his own instrument. In 1875, a French instrument maker named Dupont began repairing instruments in Conn’s shop. Conn converted an old sewing machine to a lathe and set-up a shop building these mouthpieces. Conn developed a brass mouthpiece with a rubber rim. In 1873, following a brawl in a bar which resulted in a split lip, C.G. The remaining numbers indicated the production number within the month.įrom 1987 on, the two-digit prefix number plus 50 will give you the year of manufacture.Charles Gerard Conn was the patriarch of musical instrument manufacturing in Elkhart, Indiana. The fourth character indicated the instrument: The third character indicated the year within the decade (defined by the first letter). The second character indicated the month of the year

The first character of the serial number indicated the decade In March of 1974 an alpha-numeric system was established: The years 1967 to March 1974 (when Conn moved their brass manufacturing to Abilene, Texas), is a period where at least some of the instruments were inferior in quality 1980-1986 numbers are inexact, and may relate only to student level trumpets/cornets

C g conn trumpet serial numbers 812544