A TALE OF TWO HOOVERS
This is a tale of two Mack Hoover D whistles. Six or eight weeks ago I responded to a posting on the Message Board proposing to swap metronomes for whistles. The metronomes were spoken for by the time I sent my response, in which I made the alternative offer to swap some of my photography for one of the metronomes. I think I sent some JPEG samples to get the dialogue going. The Gentleman With the Metronomes (now, no longer The Gentleman With the Metronomes) liked the pics and mentioned that, while he was no longer the Metronome Guy (those weren’t his exact words), he did have a Mack Hoover whistle that he would be willing to trade for a particular one of the photos. I was happy that he liked the shot, but made the sly counter offer that he should select two photos for the Hoover, which turned out to be one of Mack’s white CPVC D Whistles (# 789). That’s the secret of hard bargaining—never accept the first offer. I ship the pics by Priority Mail and they get there (Washington state) before Once But No Longer Metronome Guy has had a chance to ship the Hoover. Realizing that we live in a apartment, he decides to add a second Hoover to his offer. The second Hoover turns out to be one of Mack’s quiet and thin brass whistles (# 786). Metronome Guy is also a hard bargainer and tough negotiator. I get two whistles instead of one; he gets three photos instead of one. He’s happy, I’m happy. Everything is great.
Then I contact Mack Hoover. It turns out that I am (at least) the third owner of these two whistles and, even though they sound real fine, maybe in their travels (from Colorado to Niagara Falls, to Washington, to Brooklyn) they’ve lost a little of the edge that you can be assured they had when new. I e-mail Mack, who I do not know from Adam, recount what I know about the whistles, and ask if he would consider looking at them if I were willing to pay the return postage and any reasonable fee he might think appropriate for taking a look at and adjusting them. He was more than pleased to look and tune them up, but declined my offer to pay the return postage or to accept any fee for looking at or tuning the whistles. He explained that it is his policy to stand behind his whistles–apparently regardless of the chain of custody. He was glad to tune them up, but there would be no charge. (Yet another hard bargainer/tough negotiator! C & F is crawling with ‘em.) So, off the whistles went from Brooklyn to Colorado, where Mack expeditiously worked his magic on them and returned them to ‘like new’ condition.
Long story short (though now that is a lost cause), the whistles arrived back here in Brooklyn today. They are fine whistles and have the distinction of having traversed this continent at least five times. I think they will stay put for a while. The brass thin/quiet whistle challenges you to play even softer than you think possible. It will take a little getting used to. As advertised, it requires very little air. It is beautiful to look at and has a great sound. The white CPVC whistle was returned with a like new appearance and had been ‘opened up’ quite a bit. It has a fine full sound. I was real impressed by Mack’s willingness to stand by his whistles, despite the fact that I was neither their original nor their second owner. It says a lot about him.
Thanks Mack. Thanks C & F. Thanks to Metronome Guy!! A Fair exchange is no robbery.
(Note: This was written on the day the Board went down. Since time has sort of stood still in this part of Whistle World, I left it as written then (Tuesday?). I’ve since ordered some new White Caps from Mack. What the heck, you can never have too many great sounding whistles. Like many others, I have missed the C & F Board a lot. IT is true that you do not miss your water until the well runs dry.
Tom D.
It’s cool. It has a green marbelized corian fipple plug. and I also agree about Mack. He is a very decent guy.