By the end of the century, a “standard” guitar was around 12″ wide and auditorium guitars could reach 14″ wide. As the guitar became more popular, its girth gradually expanded. Introduced in 1937-’38, the Super Jumbo was the culmination of what might be called guitar “size wars.” In the mid 19th century, when American guitar making began, guitars were typically about 10″ wide at the lower bout. One of the former can be seen in this circa 1975 Penco Model A-15-JD.īasically, this Penco is a “copy” of a Gibson J-200 or Super Jumbo, a giant of a guitar burned into our minds with twin pickguards in the hands of the Everly Brothers or dwarfing the golden-throated Emmy Lou Harris. Many were quite whimsical and some very innovative. In fact, it was a lawsuit filed by Norlin (Gibson) against Elger (Ibanez) over trademark infringement (headstock copying) in Philadelphia in the summer of 1977 that gave us the now-ubiquitous term “lawsuit guitar.” But when you look a little closer, Japanese guitars from this period were about way more than copying. Indeed, it was with these “copies” that many Japanese manufacturers honed their chops and became world-class guitar makers. The 1970s is often called “the Copy Era” for the dominating presence and spectacular success of Japanese “copies” of popular American guitars, most notably of the Gibson Les Paul.
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