Donated by Capital University and Pearl Drums

The drumset that Cozy Cole performed on in the last years of his illustrious career is a fiberglass Pearl kit with a 16 x 20 bass drum, 8 x 12 rack tom, 14 x 14 and 16 x 16 floor toms, and a 5 x 14 metal-shell snare drum. The bass drum pedal is a Camco, which was one of the original pedals that Al Duffy fitted with a piece of chain when he worked at Frank Ippolito's Professional Percussion Center in New York City, thereby inventing the chain-drive bass drum pedal. (Duffy was awarded a patent for his design, which he later sold to Drum Workshop.) The kit also includes a Pearl hi-hat pedal, a Rogers cymbal stand, and a snare drum stand and cymbal stand of unknown origin. (The Zildjian cymbals displayed with the kit were not part of the original drumset.) Cozy Cole (1906-1981) achieved his greatest fame with the drum feature "Topsy," which was a hit in 1958. As a drummer, he worked with such leaders as Jelly Roll Morton, Benny Carter, Stuff Smith, Cab Calloway, Louis Armstrong, and Jonah Jones, and was also active in recording studios and theater pits. He attended the Juilliard School in the 1940s, and in the 1950s he and Gene Krupa operated a drumming school in New York.