The ebay gods have been kind to me. I just won this auction:
http://cgi.ebay.de/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=3338313833&category=23295&rd=1
The description is: “Six tin whistles in diferent colors with wood fipple in E. Printed on the flutes is ‘Made in Germany - US zone’. The whistles are in mint condition.”
The ‘US zone’ suggests that they were made between 1945 and 1949. Has anybody ever seen one of these?
cheers,
Sonja
I’ve not seen any like it before, but they look fantastic. Once I saw an American-made old Clarke-style painted whistle, under the name “Saxoflute,” on eBay.
Sonja,
I’ve seen a couple of whistles like this on Ebay with a bunch of different paint schemes and different names on it. I bought one that looks like one of those but with a different paint scheme. It wasn’t the greatest, so breathy and un-focused that it more hooted than whistled…oh well. Mine wasn’t in the best of conditions to start out with…how do yours sound?
PC
I don’t know, they haven’t arrived yet. I’ll let you know 
Sonja
They closely resemble two whistles I got from eBay a few years back, only both of mine are black with gold trimming. One has the brand name “Eagle” on it, and the other says “Calura”. The “Eagle” is not very playable, but the “Calura” is pretty darn close to a Clarke original.
~Larry
I can’t tell from the picture on eBay. Are those the ones with the Pied Piper logo or something else? If they are, I recall that Brigitte Goldie bought a big lot of them about two years ago off eBay. The type was apparently pretty common in the first half of the twentieth Century, with such examples as the Calura, Eagle, Victor and others. Most, if not all, seem to have been made in Germany both before and after WWII (Clarke excepted, of course). They were made in a number of keys. I don’t know that anyone’s ever definitively identified the manufacturer(s).
I have four, a Calura in C, an Eagle in B, and A Victor and one of the Pied Piper jobs, both in E. They’re playable, and remind me of a Clarke original, but since I don’t really like that lispy sound much they aren’t among my favorites, more collectibles than actual instruments.
Victor! That’s it, I’ve got a Victor…I had forgotten the brand there for a minute…
PC
I’m thinking those may be Caluras. I understand that Clarke made Caluras as a kind of subsidiary.
I found my Calura in a antique shop, and i dont think those are caluras. They dont have a distinctive arrow below the fipple, the decortive bands are different, i believe calura are only keyed in C. But the painting style and the fact that both are made in germany means they have to be related. Also Calura’s name is very visable on the whistle when you look at it and i can make it out in this picutre.
-andrew cassidy
they look like eagle whistles, I’ve got one in black and gold, doesn’t play very well but could probably be tweaked just like a clarke
The arrow is not unique to Calura. More or less identical arrows occur on both the Victor and Eagle, both of which were also made in Germany, probably before WWII. I’ve personally hypothesized that the brand name is in fact only a model name and is specific to keys, e.g., my Calura is a B, my Victor a C, and my Eagle is in E.
Of course, until and if we can identify a manufacturer, we’ll never really know. FWIW, I do not necessarily agree that these were made by Clarke. Based on close examination of the marks and the fact that they’re all of German origin, I suspect the real maker was whoever made the Pied Piper (US Occupied Zone) whistles. I do wish Brigitte would chime in here. I’m not sure but I thought perhaps she’d been able to identify that company.
They arrived today (seller was on vacation - I just love ebay :roll: ). Very nice, the way toys made of tin are nice to look at. No brand name, the logo is a harlekin tooting into something and a note symbol hovering beside him (is this the Pied Piper logo?). Tone a little bit more solid and less warm than my Clarke natural, unfortunately horribly out of tune. Classical Clarke folded-tin style, but much narrower “bore”, fipple only half the height of a Clarke. Nice paint job, the white ones in the picture are actually silver, the yellow ones gold-metallic.
I’m inclined to ask Jerry if he’d like to try and rescue one or two of them into playability. They are rather quiet and might make a good practise whistle.
Cheers,
Sonja