CAMPUS AND AREA University Daily Kansan, July 6, 1984 Page 6 Larry Weaver/KANSAN CC Tim Cragg, 2704 Rawhide Lane, poses in front of the 1920 Steck upright reproducing player piano he has completely rebuilt. The piano is now worth more than $6,000 and has more than 8,000 parts. Tim Cragg "I like things that are old, and I've always liked good music, and I guess that's how I got started. " Player pianos are pastime By JOHN SIMONSON Staff Reporter It may be hard for today's generation of Michael Jackson devotes to appreciate what music was like back in those dark days before electric guitars, stereos and MTV. But Tim Cragg knows. Cragg's idea of a home entertainment system doesn't include any turntables, tape decks or televisions. It does include rolls of paper, foot pedals and ivory keys. Cragg loves player pianos, those venerable one-man bands that were popular in the early part of the 20th century. They are also found in pizza parlor and museums. HE ALSO SAID that he was one of only about 500 people in the United States who repaired and restored them. By day, Cragg, 39, works for the State of Kansas as a probation officer. By night, he toils in a small workshop in the garage of his home at 2704 Rawhide Lane, surrounded by a workbench, racks filled with spare piano parts, dozens of piano rolls and a nearly-restored 1920 George Steck player piano — Cragg's own Cragg said that his love for the old instruments began with childhood piano lessons, grew to a hobby and then became a business. "I guess I was just too lazy to practice to get the good sounds that I wanted," he said. "I like things that are old, and I've always liked good music, and I guess that's how I got started." CRAGG PURCHASED his first piano player in 1975. It had been rebuilt several times, he said, but never worked quite right. "After about a year of this, I decided 'Other people aren't going to do this for me,' I'd better learn how to do it myself." he said. Cragg got some pointers from the Jones Piano Company in Kansas City, Mo., a long-time retailer of player pianos. He also read all the printed material he could find on the subject. He even went to a player piano school in Memphis, Tenn., in the fall of 1979. "I found out that there was a demand for this and I got so I could rebuild the mechanisms all right," he said. "I do not do it as well as I possibly can." SINCE THAT TIME, Cragg has repaired the mechanisms of 15 to 20 player pianos and has comple-ely restored about a dozen in his little workshop. A player piano, Cragg said, was basically a standard piano, upright or grand, with a mechanical vacuum system that played notes when holes in a paper roll allowed air to pass through rubber tubing, lifting valves that strike keys. The first player pianos, developed in the late 1800's, played only 58 notes and were played by mechanical "fingers". Later models, he said, played 65 and then 88 notes and were powered by foot pedals at the base of the piano. Eventually, electrically-powered "reproducing pianos," capable of playing music with volume and changes, became the state of the art. CRAGG ESTIMATED that there were about 15 to 20 foot-powered player pianos in Lawrence now, and about 70 powerless pianos, including his 1990 Stock "Just right here in Lawrence, there's not enough demand to make it a full-time business," he said. "But if I were in a position where I did not have to work, I would do this full time." Cragg, who charges $24 per hour for his repair work and does not advertise, said that he received business through word-of-mouth. He also said that his personal musical tastes ran toward classical music, a fact that was verified by a glance at the stacks of piano rolls on a shelf. THE BEST BAR BURGER IN THIS WHOLE WACKY TOWN IS $1.30TONIGHT INCLUDING FRIES. A full third pound of choice lean ground beef. 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