IOWA, USA ( Iowa Capital Dispatch ) - Paul Lasley’s hobby of restoring old and broken violins and donating them to Iowa State University’s instrument collection program didn’t start with a violin of his own, or really any other stringed instrument — it started with a tin clarinet.

When the retired ISU sociology professor was growing up in Queen City, Mo., he wanted to join his elementary school band. Lasley said his family couldn’t afford a new, black-painted wood clarinet, so he had to borrow an older, metal instrument from the school.

Now he’s working to make sure students who hope to find belonging and opportunity through music like he did have better equipment than was available to him, through finding and fixing fiddles and giving them to an instrument drive run by Iowa State Cent

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