... was founded in 1926 in Chicagi Il., from the joining of two Boston firms--Nokes & Nicolai and JosephPacheco with the Liberty Rawhide Company-a major Chicago supplier of banjo and drum heads from 1920.

Contemporary  articles state that Liberty had purchased the "stock and good will" of the other two companies, and moved the stock in trade and equipment  to new quarters in Chicago; each man was to have responsibility for his own end of the business, while John W. Placko, president of Liberty,  was to supervise the manufacture of the drum and

banjos heads.

Within a year the new company had failed and was sold at auction, in  August, 1927; since the factory and most of the machinery were new, there  was great competition for the assets, which were finally purchased by Slingerland