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I thought I had a J-35


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I want to say thanks to all of the wonderful, incredibly knowledgeable and passionate vintage guitar people like Willi Henkes, André Duchossoir, Robert Corwin and John Shults just to name a few. These people were so gracious in the way they willingly and without hesitation, took the time to look at the information and photos I gave them of my guitar and gave me a very good idea of what this guitar actually is. There are still a few things about the guitar that are unique, such as the scalloped bracing, ebony nut and number dilemma, but for me, they make it that much more special. It could be a prototype that accidentally got shipped to fill an order...who knows? It was called a Trojan in the ledgers...it should have been called "Special Unique Trojan"...but I won't be sending them any hate mail! lol! Thanks to Tom for his educational input and to everyone else who took an interest and contributed to this thread. Cheers, Dave

 

Dave, you will find people here to be extremely helpful, particularly when it comes to identifying vintage Gibsons--which as not always an easy task!

 

You have a wonderful guitar with a great story. Treasure it--but play it--and make sure everything about it is written down somewhere so that the history of ownership is never lost.

 

Many of us have vintage Gibsons that clearly have great stories to tell, but their voices create music, not words. We are left to wonder who owned them, and how they were used.

 

Both your story and your guitar are unique. This is a once in a lifetime possession. Please take care of it. If you or your family ever sell the guitar, make sure its history goes with it.

 

All the best,

Nick N

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After having the guitar fixed up a bit and re-strung John at the local music store played a bit to see how it played and sounded afterward...it's so nice to hear the guitar played by someone who actually has some guitar "chops" which is why, while I love trying to play it...you won't be seeing me on Youtube anytime soon! It's too bad I was only able to video a short clip, but it was enough to get him falling in love with the guitar!

 

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Wow a near thing! This story gets better and better.

 

BTW, I should point out that the AJ and the Trojan came out at the same time -- late 1936. Together, they replaced the short lived Jumbo (1934-1936). The AJ was RW -- many say to keep up with Martin. Most Trojans are exact copies of the Jumbos except for cosmetics -- they basically dumbed down the Jumbo and cut the price. Here is a picture of our Trojan with our 1935 Jumbo (The Trojan is in much better original condition) -- they are pretty much identical except for cosmetics.

 

jumboj35.jpg

 

Your guitar's differences to me are so exciting because as far as I know, this is a new page in Gibson history. You have made my day.

 

Thanks so much for sharing.

 

Best,

 

-Tom

 

thanks for the pictures Tom ... 2 beasts side by side

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

JC

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Thanks Dan...something is wrong with the last one...no doubt because of my technical prowess! If you want to see the rest of them I put on youtube, you can just click on the videos beside my name under the video that is playing. All these videos were shot with my trusty little Sony Cybershot pocket camera with no exterior microphones or lighting etc. so you'll have to pardon the quality.

 

33a141ad-00eb-41bb-8f78-5699e97fbc49_zpsc3995384.jpg

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I wanted to ask if some of you very knowledgeable acoustic guitar guys could tell me how the sound of the guitar is affected by scalloping both the bracing as well as the three tone bars as opposed to leaving them unscalloped? I know the decrease in wood equates to a larger volume of air in the sound box, but I'm wondering how this affects the tone as well as sound volume? Hmm...maybe the only way to find out is if Tom or another lucky Trojan owner and I get together, provided their guitar has unscalloped bracing and tone bars. I'll bet that would be one sweet duet!!...provided I could find someone to play mine!

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There has to be change in sound the guitar tech has in mind when he or she starts shaving the wood off the bracing and/or tone bars...I'm just curious as to what change they would be trying to achieve...I mean in any kind of acoustic guitar, not necessarily mine.

 

This reminds me of Les Paul, when he said, "When my brother would flip on the light switch and the light went on, that would be it....but when I flipped on the light switch and the light went on...I wanted to know WHY that light went on!"

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You can see the difference between my Trojan...and a "regular" Trojan. My guitar has had a lot of "tweaking" and "tuning" done to both the bracing as well as the tone bars. That is why I believe that it was likely shipped by mistake. There was probably a luthier who was very upset while trying to find his guitar...and the shipping clerk who shipped it with another Trojan... is still running! LOL! Between the ebony nut, the scalloped bracing and just a number in red pencil on the neck block...where is Sherlock when you need him?! It may be a unique oddball..but man does it sound nice! The first photo is my guitar and the second one is another Trojan from a vintage guitar library.

 

MyScallopedTrojan_zps4ac56bb6.jpg

 

36_trojan_8_zps84d7787d.jpg

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Thanks so much. Like I said, it's unique compared to the other Trojans for whatever reason. Someone building this guitar took a long time with it, because there was a lot of wood slowly shaved off the bracing and tone bars, you can tell it was being "tuned"to the luthier's ear...which is why I am so lucky, because "his or her ear" is what makes this guitar sound (as people who have played it say)amazing, awesome, gorgeous, as well as various and sundry positive expletives I can't use here. Then it was shipped along with another Trojan to Canada. Who knows the part of it's story where it got packed up to fill an order for 2 Trojans...yep, I think someone goofed and put this prototype (or someone's personal guitar) into fill the order. Lucky for me...I'm not so sure about the guy who shipped it! Thanks again for your compliment.

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Someone building this guitar took a long time with it, because there was a lot of wood slowly shaved off the bracing and tone bars, you can tell it was being "tuned"to the luthier's ear...which is why I am so lucky, because "his or her ear" is what makes this guitar sound (as people who have played it say)amazing, awesome, gorgeous, as well as various and sundry positive expletives I can't use here. Then it was shipped along with another Trojan to Canada. Who knows the part of it's story where it got packed up to fill an order for 2 Trojans...yep, I think someone goofed and put this prototype

 

You have a very rare and desirable early dreadnought guitar, there's no question about that. It's sort of a transitional model made at a time when the specifications for a lot of Gibson guitars were changing rapidly. There are other flat tops from that time that have an ebony nut so it's not unusual.

 

I don't think it's a prototype as everything we know about Gibson from the Great Depression era suggests it was a production facility. All guitars were built to sell. The guitars changed from batch to batch. If anything, the few different details might be the result of rushing to fill an order and using what was on hand. The braces are nicely scalloped like an AJ and some later models, but I doubt that the person who carved the braces ever heard the guitar played, or even saw it with strings on it. Carve that stack of tops before 3pm and roll the rack to the next station or you're fired. Remember that Gibson really prided itself on archtop guitars, which led their product line and descended from Orville Gibson's patents. They were sort of reluctantly dragged into the flat top market. Today things are different.

 

It's tempting to mythologize a rare & valuable guitar, but the reality is that it probably had as much attention as the L-00 or Roy Smeck Stage Deluxe made at the same time.

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I have heard the same things regarding the production practices of depression era guitars at Gibson. I have no misconceptions about my guitar being some kind of priceless artifact...but it is kind of fun trying to fantasize a bunch of different pieces of guitar, from different models...being frantically thrown together to build a model that was purported to have a production run of a few months at best. It must have been a bit of a nightmare for the production manager in that department. Cartoons of that period come to mind. The point I was making is that however they managed to put the pieces of this guitar together and wherever the pieces came from...they definitely got it right.

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I guess what a meant regarding the scalloped bracing and tone bars was that a luthier spent a lot of time "tweaking" and "tuning" while shaving the wood off the original bracing and tone bars which were used in making the pattern or template used on the production line. Earlier I was asking if anyone knew off hand how the scalloping effects the tone and what a luthier has in mind when he decides to do it. I need to read up on that kind of thing. I'm not that savvy when it comes to the workings of an acoustic guitar, but I know what sounds good...and there guys on these forums who have some stout thumpers!

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