When it rains it pours ;] '66 S-50 x 2 Beauty and the Beast

Guildedagain

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Oops, I Guilded again, and again.

So, I'm not getting the clean '66 Sunburst til the 7th, and this other one pops up, and with an unreasonable offer I got it too, and it will be here on the 11th. Oh thank heaven for 7-11 ;] Not sure when it was listed, but it seemed to be flying under the radar, and it's as crusty as the other one was clean.

The beauty - SA-134 - was from Clovis California, apparently they only sold 100 of these in '66, SA-101 to 201.


And the beast - SA 207 - from Arcadia California, this is a '67 actually, the 5th 1967 guitar built, only 288 of these made in '67, SA-202 to 490.


What's the chance of this, these two guitars were only 3hrs away from each other, with Bakersfield in the middle. I imagine they maybe both sold at the same Guild dealer back in '66/'67.

They're both Sunbursts, and they both have Tremar Trem.

The beast is a red Sunburst, seller apparently unaware as he called it Cherry.

Beauty, seller pics.

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Waverly inline tuners

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And the beast. Gird yourself, it needs some love. It's as worn as the other one is not. The headstock logos are different, SA-207 having the V under the Guild, which I like better actually. Beauty is Alder, unusual for Guild, and Beast I assume is Mahogany, so this should make for an interesting tone test.

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spoox

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Yup--thought about that one too--saw it when it was originally priced like $1085, then when I looked again 2 days later it had dropped to the $950/best offer.
I again struggled to resist it--I'd still like to get one to go with my Polara--the "Beauty" has the same alder/sunburst as my S100, and the "Beast's" condition compared to the clean one made it easier to talk myself out of it. I guess I'll just have to content myself with my
SUPROSUPER7a.jpg

Short Scale '65 Supro Super Seven (alliteration!) for now for that pickup in the middle thing. I had to get it a couple of years ago so I could
have the cheapest (Super Seven) and most expensive (Martinique) Supros from the '60s. The tailpiece cover is the same stamping as the
National single cone resonator handrest--waste not--want not...
 

hansmoust

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So, I'm not getting the clean '66 Sunburst til the 7th, and this other one pops up, and with an unreasonable offer I got it too, and it will will be here on the 11th. Oh thank heaven for 7-11 ;] Not sure when it was listed, but it seemed to be flying under the radar, and it's as crusty as the other one one was clean.

The beauty - SA-134 - was from Clovis California, apparently they only sold 100 of these in '66, SA-101 to 201

And the beast - SA 207 - from Arcadia California, this is a '67 actually, the 5th 1967 guitar built, only 288 of these made in '67, SA-202 to 490.

Take another close look at the serial number charts! They give the last number for each year, so #SA-134 would be from 1965 and #SA-207 is from 1966.

Have fun with both of 'm!

Sincerely,

Hans Moust
www.guitarsgalore.nl
 

Guildedagain

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Thx all ;]

Take another close look at the serial number charts! They give the last number for each year, so #SA-134 would be from 1965 and #SA-207 is from 1966.

Have fun with both of 'm!

Sincerely,

Hans Moust
www.guitarsgalore.nl


Maybe my serial number lists are not right?

This is from a saved PDF "Dating your Guild"

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Is there another serial number list online?



Cool.
I like the Cherry burst one even though it needs some love.


I like the red one too. And I only need one, I'll keep one and peddle the other to fund other guitars. The red one is a lot more up my alley with all the little dings, it's got character.

I'm interested to find out which one I like the tone of better, rather than saying which one sounds better.

Cool Supro, rare one, and so clean! I don't have any other guitars with the pickup in the middle.
 
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fronobulax

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Maybe my serial number lists are not right?

Is there another serial number list online?

The most accurate, published source of serial number data up through 1977 is Hans' book. The chart there corrects errors that are in every online source I have seen. Hans has chosen not to publish his chart on line and I can imagine copyright issues if anyone else did so.

The most accurate source (note the absence of the word "published") is Hans himself since he has corrections to the published charts in his book and has not yet published the corrected information from 1977 and beyond.

You need to be careful with making the assumption that serial numbers correspond to production volume for a model since there are exceptions. Similarly since serial numbers were assigned before a completed instrument left the factory there are cases where a significant amount of time lapsed between when the serial was assigned and when the instrument left the factory. There are also cases where a higher serial number was completed before a lower one and ranges of serial numbers that were unintentionally reused.

As an example, the catalog says the Starfire bass was introduced in 1965 and the online chart lists BA101-BA177 as the 1965 serials. Yet there are documented Starfire basses with a five digit serial number corresponding to 1964. Saying there were 76 basses produced in 1965 is possibly incorrect and what does a date actually mean for a bass serial number that dates to 1964 but was not "introduced" until 1965?
 

Guildedagain

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Well, there's a reason to anticipate Hans's new book then, as year to year serial number ranges are sometimes expanded over time as more models surface, unless this info was from Guild's records, than nothing would have changed.

I'm losing faith in the Dating your Guild info now.

One more reason to browse the book ;]
 

SFIV1967

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Maybe my serial number lists are not right? This is from a saved PDF "Dating your Guild". Is there another serial number list online?
Nothing wrong with the list there in your case. It shows 1965 101-201 and 1966 202-490.

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So your 134 fits into 1965 and 207 in 1966 but you said '66 and '67 initially!

Ralf
 

Guildedagain

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Nothing wrong with the list there in your case. It shows 1965 101-201 and 1966 202-490.

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1620143123470.png


So your 134 fits into 1965 and 207 in 1966 but you said '66 and '67 initially!

Ralf


Eyes play tricks, and it was 9:45p after a really long day... but knowing how to read a list is important too ;]

Somehow, because SA-134 was listed as a '66, I thought, '66, and '67. But so it is '65 and '66. Wow, the two oldest Guilds I've ever had, but don't have quite yet.

Anyone have Guild dealer info from SoCal around that time?
 
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HeyMikey

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Congratulations. Terrific scores. I bet you can tame the Beast a bit with some TLC. Man, put an F or the other G on the headstock and you would have to add an extra zero to the price. Well done!
 

mavuser

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very cool, again...congrats! I was tempted to offer on the cherry burst, I already have the same one, but the headstock is not black. anyway happy it wound up with you, as I have plenty. possibly more impressive than the 2 Jetstars is that they both had the hard case. seen ninety something percent of the time with an S-200 or S-100. S-50 usually had the chip board, like all four I have owned (still own 3 of them- 64, 65, and 66)
 

fronobulax

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Well, there's a reason to anticipate Hans's new book then, as year to year serial number ranges are sometimes expanded over time as more models surface, unless this info was from Guild's records, than nothing would have changed.

I'm losing faith in the Dating your Guild info now.

One more reason to browse the book ;]

Hans' sources include Guild records as well as records that were thrown out and rescued from a dumpster. Plus anything he gleans from photos and hand on inspections and correspondence with owners.

Guild at some point published what it had but there were transcription and proofreading errors as well as omissions. Some online sources tried to republish making what were thought to be obvious corrections. Some of those were right, others were not.

People make a lot of mistakes dealing with Guild serial numbers. The biggest ones, IMO are: expecting the current Guild Guitar Company to have complete and accurate information over the life of the brand; expecting things published online to be complete and/or accurate; and assuming serial number sequences correspond to chronological sequences.

That said, you get out your salt shaker and use the Guild published Dating Your Guild PDF. If you can find what you want, it makes sense, and there don't seem to be any funny data in the surrounding portions of the table then you are probably safe in using the PDF.
 

walrus

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That said, you get out your salt shaker and use the Guild published Dating Your Guild PDF. If you can find what you want, it makes sense, and there don't seem to be any funny data in the surrounding portions of the table then you are probably safe in using the PDF.

Ok, this will bother me if I don't ask - are saying "take the information with a grain of salt"?

walrus
 

Guildedagain

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As the farmers say around here "take it with a saltlick" ;]]

Actually, my bad on misreading the Dating your Guild info. It was late, the year column was a long ways up from the S50 serial numbers, so I couldn't see it, and I assumed that the 1st column was 1966, because SA-134 was sold as a 1966, but no one said anything, that it was in fact a 1965.

Very rarely, if ever, do I delve into the earlier serial number boxes. Mostly always look up numbers that correspond to 1970's guitars, so I didn't automatically know that the 1st column was 1965, but now I do.

The ending numbers for '65, '66, '67 in the Dating you Guild chart match the book perfectly, so they only made 483 of these over three years, rare indeed.

Probably impossible to find actual production figures for SG Jr's during the same time period, which is too bad, because I'd like to compare that rarity factor. If you thought Guild serial numbers were a somewhat messy affair, you haven't looked into Gibson serial numbers before...
 

lungimsam

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Those white knobbed worm tuners bring back bad memories of the seized worm tuners on my first acoustic. Ouch!! Hurts to tune this thing!!
 
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