Walter Broes
Enlightened Member
Fascinating stuff for us Guild-geeks Dokker, thanks for posting!
jazzman said:Wow this is some very interesting information! On the first page was a reply with the thought that there could be some connection to the Epiphone tone spectrum pickups, and the premier pickups.
For sure the premier pickups are Fransch pickups, though the pole pieces are offset. I'd LOVE to see the inside of that pickup to see how it differs from the normal guild variant.
On the subject of Epiphone...I wonder. I have noticed a similarity between them though it's a small one. The lead wires that come out of the pickup coil that attach to the leads on both the Epis and the Fransch pickups are a thin wire wrapped in green thread. That's the only similarity between them.
Now there is a matter of speculation involved here, but if you'll indulge me on this it might prove interesting.
Guild was Founded by Alfred, and George Mann. I'm guessing that it was more George who wanted to start Guild since he had just lost his longtime position with Epiphone after the Company reorganized in '52 in response to the factory strike.
As mentioned in the Guild Book, a handful of former Epi employees went to work for guild, most impressive to me was Henry. Henry was a man who was quite elderly at the time and had been with Epiphone since Anastasios started the company.
Anyway, sorry for the rambling, since 'business is business' I think it's TOTALLY reasonable to think that Frank Schultz could have worked at Epiphone in their "electar lab" possibly making pickups (Epiphone did make their own pickups), or perhaps he was just a good friend of George Mann, and George wanted to send business to his friend.
Obviously George was not around for much longer after the start of the company, but perhaps since a good thing was going, or perhaps there was a contract to buy pickups from them for so many years (again I'm just speculating here) maybe that's why they used those pickups for so long until Gilbert convinced Guild to switch to DeArmond.
Those are my insane ramblings on the subject. Thoughts?
Also on the subject of DeArmond, I've given thought to trying to research a book on DeArmond. That would be a great book, with tons of pictures of all the various pickups they made, company history etc....but that's a thought for another day.