Gibson Guitars

Gibson guitars started in the early nineteen hundreds.                                                                          Gibson pioneered the acoustic guitar with an arch top in 1924 with the L5  and also a hollow body electric in 1935 called the ES-150.

The involvement with electric solid body’s came later when over a weekend Mr Les Paul tried an experiment by cutting an Epiphone f holed guitar down the very middle and fixed a 10mm by 10mm piece of solid maple in the middle and then simply mounted two single coil pick ups and a Gibson finger board and neck.

When he had fitted machine heads and a tailpiece and plugged it in – it worked but it was really heavy and so it was called “ The Log “, when Les brought the idea to Gibson, they were not impressed  or even interested in taking the idea any further calling it the “Broomstick with a pickup on it “, then in 1950 they came looking for him, signed him up and agreed to pay him a royalty on every guitar with his name on it.

Les Paul stayed with Gibson and eventually  after approx. 50 guitars he felt happy with his design, so in 1952 the “Gibson Les Paul “ went into production.   In the beginning the company director Mr Maurice Berlin thought they should be called ” Les Paul “ and not bear the name Gibson, as it might not be good for the company, but not long after he changed his mind and said to put the name on “ just in case it takes off.

The goal of the design team was to have the guitar with a natural twenty second sustain time, which is why the body was made of solid mahogany with a 12 mm maple facing on it. The profile top was in fact intended to make it hard to copy and  a “ Gibson Les Paul “ is very heavy, and time proved how right Mr Berlin was …… to be continued ..