You may be way past these suggestions, but you have to start somewhere.
1st is the dist hooked up to manifold or ported vacuum?
It needs to be ported, somewhere on the carb where vacuum increases with throttle opening.
With 1100 rpm idle speed he probably is pulling some adv in the dist.
I would disconnect the vacuum to eliminate possible other issues, like vacuum leak, primary butterflies open too much, or secondary butterflies out of adjustment. If you do not experience the high idle with the dist vacuum disconnected and plugged, you will need to grab a timing light. You should not be pulling any vacuum adv at normal idle speeds.
If you will post what you find in these areas, we should be able to get you to a reasonable idle.
good luck,
railroad
If a hammer won't fix it, it's and electrical problem