She had this [barbecue pit] piled up full of hickory. She comes out with this two gallon can of gasoline & she up-ends this thing over the hickory... As she walks away from the pit she takes a kitchen match, strikes it on her butt, throws it over her shoulder, causes an explosion 30 feet into the air. Then she walked by and said: 'Be ready'n about an hour...' - Steve James, Port Townsend 97
My girlfriend bought this guitar for $75 at a thrift store. It's been hanging on the wall until I finally did some sloppy repairs recently. I still can't believe how good it sounds!! It doesn't have any numbers, labels or anything anywhere to help identify it. Anyone have a clue what this thing is?
Hi Mike..cool guitar, I love finding 'em like that and with a little work have great sound and are fun to play..enjoyed your vid. That headstock shape looks very Harmony-ish, and cheap Harmonys made in the 40s share that shape, or at least very close to that. The tuners, assuming original, date to the 40s for sure as the gears are riveted rather than screwed on. Harmony typically had all kinds of painted logos and designs on their guitars, plus numbers rubber ink-stamped inside the body..look inside with a flashlight, you may see some...but they jobbed out tons of guitars to retailers sans logos, so, who knows. When in doubt .. "Chicago made" Have fun with it..Tom
Much thanks, folks!! I think I've tried the flashlight approach, but I'll give it another shot. We weren't guessing it would be that old, but now I see what you mean about the gears. I never would've noticed that. I can't believe what a score this was! I'm trying to convince my girlfriend to officially trade me this guitar for my Simon and Patrick Parlor (which has ten times as much invested in it), but I can play it whenever I want anyway so....
Just had another look inside and I can't find a single letter or number anywhere. I did get a look at the bracing pattern from looking through the strap peg hole on the bottom... Not what I would've guessed (not like I know anything about this stuff)... It's got two hefty lookin' braces running parallel from top to bottom. Kinda like this but closer together: