I bought these Red Ludwig Vistalites in August of 2001. I bought them off my friend Mac, who bought them off a church. Mac bought them for his son to learn on. Of course, a pre-teen doesn't have an appreciation of a vintage instrument, and lets just they they weren't in the best condition. I took them home, cleaned them up, put new heads on, replaced some parts, and now the look pretty good.

These drums are from around 1975. Before 1975, the the Ludwig badge was mounted opposite the muffling knob. Also, the muffling knob is held on with two screws instead of one. The seam is on the inside of the drum, where early Vistas had the seam on the outside, filled with a resin, and then sanded. Much more information can be found on www.vistalites.com.

Here's a tom as I found it. (Click images for the full size versions.)
Here's the same tom inside.
Here's a shell, bare and polished.
Here's the same drum, with chrome and shell polished. The 12" tom was badly cracked. Here's a shot of the crack. (Cracking is quite common with Vistalites.)