Bob Gaff To Be Inducted Into World Drum Corps Hall Of Fame As 2007 Lifetime Achievement Award Winner
Bob Gaff, of Mount Laurel, New Jersey is the 2007 winner of the World Drum Corps Hall of Fame President’s Lifetime Achievement Award; his fourth such honor by prominent drum corps organizations.
He will be inducted into the World Hall of Fame along with six other new members at the annual ceremony to be held in Rochester, New York on Labor Day weekend. Gaff, who was among the first Hall of Fame associate members inducted when that category was introduced in 2001, was selected for the lifetime achievement honor this year by president George Bull, of Baltimore, Maryland. He will be inducted as a regular member in September.
Gaff was inducted into the Buglers’ Hall of Fame in Bridgeport, Connecticut in July 2005; 50 years after his first involvement in drum corps. In September 2005 he was inducted into the Pennsylvania Drum Corps Hall of Fame. He was elected to the Massachusetts Drum Corps Hall of Fame in 2001.
His drum corps career began when he spent seven years with St. Rose of Chelsea, Maryland, beginning in 1955. In 1963 and 1964, he played with St. Kevin’s Emerald Knights in Boston, and was a member of the undefeated national champion brass quartet in both years. In the later years of the 1960s, he marched with Blessed Sacrament Golden Knights, the United States Air Force Academy corps, and Reilly Raiders.
He was a member of the Yankee Rebels, of Baltimore, from 1969 to 1974, winning three American Legion national championships: in 1969, 1970 and 1971. In 1994, he marched with the Bushwackers, of Harrison, NJ.
He has marched with several alumni corps, including Yankee Rebels, Archer-Epler Musketeers, Reilly Raiders, St. Lucy’s Cadets, Blessed Sacrament Golden Knights, New York Skyliners and the Princemen. He was named a lifetime member of the Reilly Raiders in 2000.
The six other men who will be inducted during the Hall of Fame’s annual luncheon, to be held at noon, Saturday September 1, at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in downtown Rochester are: Jim Bell, of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Ray Eyler, of Audubon, New Jersey; David Kampschroer, of City Lady Lakes, Florida; Joseph ‘Fast Franky’ Nash, of Hackettstown, New Jersey; Robbie Robinson, of West Chester, Pennsylvania and Scotty Wild, of St. Paul Minnesota.
The Hall of Fame induction ceremony is part of the 2007 Drum Corps Associates (DCA) championship tournament weekend. The Crowne Plaza is located across the Genesee River from the venues for the Individual and Ensemble (I&E) competitions and old fashioned outdoor drum corps party to be held Friday evening August 31, and just a few blocks from PAETEC Park Stadium, where the DCA preliminaries, Alumni Classic concert and DCA finals will take place.
Since its founding in 1976 by the late Vince Bruni, of Rochester, membership in the World Drum Corps Hall of Fame has grown from six charter members, including current president George Bull, to more than 400 regular and associate members from the United States and Canada, who have contributed to the activity across North America, Europe, Africa and Japan. Bruni also founded the Empire Statesmen, the five-time DCA championship corps that is sponsoring the 2007 DCA tournament in Rochester for the second year in a row on Labor Day weekend.
More information about the World Drum Corps Hall of Fame is available at www.worlddrumcorpshof.org/
