#0569 1954 Gold Stratocaster owned and played by Eldon Shamblin. Beautiful grain of ash wood is showing through gold. The green color part comes from natural oxidation of bronze powder in the finish over a long period of time. (From The Galaxy Of Strats book)
#8575 Metallic green Stratocaster. Already rare color for a 50’s Strat, yet the aluminum pickguard makes it even rarer. It still shows the original horizontally slanted hairline finish on the surface. (From The Galaxy Of Strats book)
Super rare 50’s Silver Stratocaster. It stands out as it has almost no clear top coat over silver. Because of that, the amber color aging effect usually comes from clear lacquer top coat is almost non-existent. As a result, this guitar has its own very clean and classy, “holly” look.
#-17051 Homer Haynes’ gold Stratocaster with gold anodized aluminum pickguard. The one on the cover of “The Galaxy Of Strats” book.
#7070 Found the original positive in the vault. (From The Galaxy Of Strats book)
Found the original positive. This unusual control arrangement with sub-plate on top of pickguard is original and extremely rare. George Fullerton’s own one of a kind Strat also had this arrangement. The black part of the pickguard is made with anodized aluminum.
#9 1876 The one on the cover of BOTB (The Beauty of The ‘Burst). It was once owned by Paul Stanley of Kiss. The top is covered by thick and 3 dimensional tiger stripe with its left side stripe just slightly going up. One remarkable thing on this one is the weight. Super, super light.
#9 0663 Joe Perry’s dark burst. It was played on numerous stages of Aerosmith gig. It once left Joe’s hand for a while but found and returned home thanks to the effort of his mutual friend guitar player.
#9 0913 “Brock ‘burst”. It is one of the earliest recognized “primo” ‘Burst. Famous for its clean condition, deep burgundy wine-like ‘burst color.
#9 0875 Original cherry tops do exist, but it is really rare. This one has a Bigsby from the factory.
#8 3096 This one is from Slash’s collection. The guitar radiates a spirit of road warrior.
#8 3688 BOTB was supposed to be a book of ‘Bursts. But I could not just help including this one in. Black is a default color for Les Paul Custom, but super rare on Standard (this model designation comes a bit later but here it is used for comparison). It has been reported that there may be another one just like this.
#8 3324 Although not certain that it was built for her, collectors call this one “Mary Ford” model. Probably impressed by its gorgeous set up. Mary Ford was the singer (and sometimes co-guitarist) of Les Paul duo. Mary was also Les Paul’s wife. This guitar really fits to Mary’s image nicely so I really hope someone can prove it is her model . So far, only one of this version known to exist.
#0463 1954 Stratocaster This is one of the proto types from 1954. This was used by parts vender to make dies and jigs for the production. The pickguard is a clear plastic painted from the back. The material is rather thin and somehow curled up on the edge so that part was replaced by white 1 ply pickguard in actual production. No other example of gold plastic pickguard 54 is known to exist.
2 Pick Up #7070 as it appears on “The Galaxy Of Strats”. The only 2 pu Strat I have seen. The neck width at nut is 2 inchs! The head shape actually looks different because of that. Was originally Fiesta red, refinished to black, then stripped natural and clear lacquer applied as shown here. It appears that the pickguard was originally an anodized gold (aluminum), which is a most likely match to fiesta red body. Anodized pickguard usually wears where pick hits so on this one the thin gold color on top may have been sanded away and bare aluminum polished. This conclusion is drawn that all anodized guards always have slanted hairline marks but this guiatr does not show it. Under the pickguard, very interesting body top cavity routing can be seen. Only the control cavity and lead pickup cavity was routed using regular template. The second pickup is positioned in-between where center and front pickup are. The cavity and cable clearance routing appears to be done freehand or using a temporary jig.
It appears that the additional routing was done on existing completed body at the factory. Note the depth of routing is shallow where pots go. Full depth where the switch is with ample space for wiring around it. Note the routing of this part is actually very close to the edge of body and is barely covered by the pickguard.
Showing the wiring inside. Length of wires were added on existing completed pickups in order to reach the switch and pots at new further away location.
Controls are at completely different location. Mostly much closer to the edge of the body. Only exception is the knob at the end which moved approx. 1/8 towards the jack plate. Chrome plated thin metal plate was laid over black anodized pickguard to make this arrangement possible. Note the location of the screw on sub plate, between first knob and middle pickup. This screw does not go into the body. Rather, it is secured by the nut inside. This is because there was not enough wood for the screw to hold on to on original routing. If you go back to routing picture, you can see that the routing was enlarged on that spot to clear the nut inside.
All rosewood Stratocaster. Its brother, all rosewood Telecaster (famous for George Harrison’s rooftop Get Back performance) was a hollow body. This one is all solid. The reason may have been due to Stratocaster’s contour body design. Only one is known to exist from this era.