Spartans Drum & Bugle Corps

The Spartans Drum and Bugle Corps is an Open Class competitive junior drum and bugle corps. Based in Nashua, New Hampshire, the Spartans performs in Drum Corps International (DCI) competitions. The Spartans won the DCI Division II World Championship in 1997, 1998, 2004, 2005, and 2007, and in 2019 won the DCI Open Class Championship that replaced Divisions II and III in 2008. The Spartans Drum and Bugle Corps was founded in 1955 by Albert LaFlamme as a way to keep at-risk youth off of the streets. Mr. LaFlamme was succeeded as corps director by his son Peter. Today, the corps is run by Albert’s grandson, Paul "PG" LaFlamme Jr. Over the corps' long history, it has performed for Presidents Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, and George H.W. Bush. In 1990, the corps was gifted with a corps hall that also hosted their bingo operation. A fire in 1999 destroyed nearly everything the corps owned: instruments, uniforms, equipment, vehicles. The dedication of the corps' members, staff, and supporters, as well as the greater drum corps community, kept the corps in operation and in competition, with the corps placing second that year at DCI Division II Finals in Madison, Wisconsin. Despite being DCI Division II Champions five time, in 2009, the economic downturn known as the "Great Recession" forced the Spartans into bankruptcy. Bingo revenues had dropped off to a point where the corps discontinued that fundraising activity. Efforts to sell the corps hall had not been successful, although payments were still due on the hall's mortgage. The corps went through a year of inactivity and reorganized, including a change of management and sale of the corps hall for an amount large enough to pay off the corps' debts. The corps then successfully returned to competition in 2010.