A Short History of Gibson

   The origins of the Gibson Musical Instrument company can be traced to one Orville H. Gibson. He was a native of Chateaugay, New York but was living in Kalamazoo, Michigan by 1881. The exact date he began building musical instruments is unknown, but by 1896 he was working at the trade full time. His most noteworthy and long-lasting contribution to musical instrument construction is his re-design of the traditional bowl-back mandolin. He advocated a thinner instrument with a carved top and back, built along the lines of a violin. He filed a patent for such an instrument in 1895. The new design was well received and on October 10, 1902 the Gibson Mandolin-Guitar Manufacturing Company Limited was formed in Kalamazoo by Orville and five partners. For reasons that remain unclear Orville was no longer active in the company by 1911 and died in New York state during 1918.

   Buoyed by the popularity of the mandolin at the turn of the twentieth century, the Gibson Mandolin-Guitar Manufacturing Company prospered. Another secret to their success was the “teacher-agent.” In these early years Gibson did not sell their product through retail music stores, but instead wholesaled directly to local music teachers who in turn, sold to the public. The “teacher-agent” had a powerful ally in the Gibson marketing department. Gibson catalogs from the period are filled with the kind of rhetoric more suited to the evangelistic preacher than a musical instrument retailer. A schedule of time payments made the instruments available to many who could not otherwise afford such items.

   From 1917 until 1984 Gibson instruments were constructed in a factory on Parsons Street in Kalamazoo. It was in this building that most of Gibson’s most notable innovations and memorable instruments were conceived. The adjustable truss rod, the F-5 mandolin, the L-5 guitar, the Les Paul guitar and of course, the Mastertone banjo first saw the light of day there.

   About 1910 the tango dance craze and the rising market for jazz music gave birth to a new instrument, the tenor banjo. Gibson did not respond to this change in the market and in fact did not build its first banjos until 1918. Instead they invested in a major re-design of the mandolin, culminating in 1923 in the “Master-Model” or F-5. The new mandolins were indeed spectacular, perhaps the finest ever produced, but the market for them had long faded and Gibson found itself in financial jeopardy by 1923. New management in 1924 brought sweeping changes. The company was re-named, becoming simply Gibson Incorporated. For the first time instruments were wholesaled to music stores, initiating Gibson dealerships. An in-house sales force was organized to promote the products. And finally the popularity of the tenor banjo was acknowledged.

   The Gibson banjos produced from 1918 until 1924 were considered to be terrible instruments. Many professional musicians thought them to be over-priced and even the president of Gibson acknowledged that they “had the worst reputation of any banjo on the market.” The designs used were indeed antiquated and did not produce the tone and volume required by the jazz dance band. Other manufacturers, but especially Paramount and Bacon were killing Gibson in banjo sales.

   During 1924 a complete re-design of the Gibson banjo was undertaken. It seems evident today that a major part of the structural changes were copied from the Paramount banjos of the time. Included in these are the detachable curved back resonator, the metal flange and the violin shaped peghead. But at the heart of the new banjo was a heavy maple rim capped by a metal tone ring mounted on a set of spring loaded ball bearings. The added mass gave the new banjo volume and tone. In 1925 the newly minted “Mastertone” banjo was introduced to the public and met with immediate success.

   From 1925 until 1929 Gibson continued to add new models and features to their banjo line. The cast tone ring replaced the ball-bearing system in 1927 and for a short period of time in 1928 there were so many banjo orders that a second production line had to be initiated. In the same year Gibson planned another major banjo re-design which would cut costs and make assembly slightly easier. New pearl inlay patterns, a cast,one-piece flange and a new peghead design were all in the works. However the fall of the stock market in October 1929 signaled the death knell of the banjo market and delayed the introduction of these features until 1932.

   In the early 1930's Gibson struggled economically along with the rest of the nation. In 1931 they produced more wooden toys than musical instruments. The rise of hillbilly and western music and the popularity of radio brought a slight resurgence to the company in the last half of the 1930's. During this period Gibson produced more five string banjos than ever before and shifted the focus of production to low-end, affordable flat-top guitars and introduced a line of Hawaiian guitars. Unbelievably, the company invested in a third re-design of their banjo line, debuting in 1937 with top tension head adjustments, an art deco peghead and a new, heavier resonator. Very few of these banjos were produced as once again Gibson refused to acknowledge a major change in the market. click here to continue