Maestro Ring Modulator - New Flickr Shot

I missed this one when putting up this post - it comes from the same flickr set by ruk777. I just saw it on Sendling. The caption reads:
"to my knowledge, this is the first ring Modulator ever created. It was part of the 'Analog synthesizer' module that Bob Moog, Tom Oberheim and the folks at ARP worked on in the 70s. That is basically where all the early Maestro "pedals" came from. This piece is super rare,and though it is missing its foot pedal, it would command a lot of dough on Ebay"

If you know the truth behind this either way, feel free to comment.

Via Pinkus in the comments: "this is true. late moog worked for maestro...making the big mtal tank looking pedals with the contols on the side (phaser, distortion filter...ect)"

Via Tommy Dog in the comments: "Tom Oberheim was building these during the late 60's, he had done the first Phaser pedal for Maestro which was owned by Gibson / Norlin.

Norlin bought Moog later in the 70's and there were some product devolopment shared by Moog and Maestro (who farmed out many pedal designs to others)."

Via David in the comments:
"I doubt it's the first ring modulator. Harald Bode developed a ring modulator for Moog (the Bode Ring Modulator Model 6401 and Bode Dual Ring Modulator Model 6402) in 1963. Check out the Bode page on Obsolete.com.

According to the Moog Archives there's a Bode Dual about 1000' from me right now."

Update via dmxkrew: "If you're interested in those early maestro pedals, oberheim effect pedals etc, I read this interesting book by tom hughes: link"