1930s? Imperial Hawaiian Music Studios Guitar

[fritzk3]

So, The story of how I obtained this instrument is pretty straight forward... I went to an extremely small back-woods flea market over the weekend with my family, and the guy said it was pretty much worthless junk then sold it to me for ten dollars. I've spent the past four days looking for information on the instrument with no avail. That is when I decided to post it here and see what type of response you guys give me.

Here is what I know about it:

It does have its original case, and it came with sheet music (around seven or eight songs) dated 1935 and 1936, with somebodies old musical notes written on them! I figure it probably was made around this time, and somebody loved it dearly. It has the original owners name scratched in to the bottom, and also had two finger picks from the 1930s inside of it.

[VintAxe]

Hi fritzk3.

I really can not tell you anything specific about your guitar but I might be able to help a bit. I think you are right about the date, these stencil guitars became popular in the 1930's and were produced up until the early 1960's. The most popular stencil patterns were Cowboy and Hawaiian themes. Your instrument has a pretty basic stencil pattern so it was probably a $10 guitar back in the 30's.

I don't know for sure but I suspect Imperial Hawaiian Music Studios was a less successful version of the Oahu business model. They made their money by providing introductory student level instruments and then selling the new students all the sheet music and accessories they would buy.

The most knowledgeable stencil guitar authority I know about is Steve Evans. He collects Cowboy guitars but likely knows something about your Hawaiian. You can contact him through his Cowboy guitar museum.



At the end of the day your guitar is probably worth around $75 to a Hawaiian stencil collector but you did bring to light an interesting historical artifact. If you find out anything about the Imperial Hawaiian Music Studios please let us know.

Keep diggin' at the Flea Markets