Post by CTGull on Jan 3, 2024 17:37:32 GMT -5
The Story – I got a morning email notification from eBay that a Silvertone guitar was recently posted. When I checked, it may have been posted only an hour ago. It had a starting bid of $95, and 5 days to go. The pictures were very dark and fuzzy, so it was hard to see any detail. He did show one small ding and some finish crazing on the side. There were no strings on it, and no side view, so determining the approximate action was impossible. But that’s not a big deal. I set a reminder in my calendar to bid on it Sunday morning at 9am, although I figured it would be up to $500 by then. Before I went up to bed checked the ad and found he had added a “Buy It Now” option of $250, which I immediately did.
The next morning, I asked him if there was any story behind the guitar. He sent: “We acquired this guitar from an older couple who had an estate sale. It was covered in dust and the strings were hanging off. They did not have it for sale, however. I asked if they had any old vinyl and they said no but they had a guitar that had been there forever. It looked very sturdy and was made in the USA, so we had to buy it. “
Later, I was curious about the range of years this model was made. Silvertone guitars were sold by Sears and made by various well-known manufacturers, like Harmony and Kay. The 1220 is a sunburst version of the Harmony Sovereign H1260. A couple of years ago I had spent many hours downloading the guitar related scanned pages of all the Sears catalogs (1896 to 1980). I found the 1220 replaced the 633 in the Fall of 1968 and was last sold in the Fall of 1969. The catalog pages showed the pickguard changed in the Fall of 1969, so the 1220 with the “teardrop” shaped pickguard was only sold for 1 year. The 1221 was introduced in the Spring of 1969, which replaced the “Silvertone” logo on the headstock with the “space dot”.
You can read more about it HERE.
The next morning, I asked him if there was any story behind the guitar. He sent: “We acquired this guitar from an older couple who had an estate sale. It was covered in dust and the strings were hanging off. They did not have it for sale, however. I asked if they had any old vinyl and they said no but they had a guitar that had been there forever. It looked very sturdy and was made in the USA, so we had to buy it. “
Later, I was curious about the range of years this model was made. Silvertone guitars were sold by Sears and made by various well-known manufacturers, like Harmony and Kay. The 1220 is a sunburst version of the Harmony Sovereign H1260. A couple of years ago I had spent many hours downloading the guitar related scanned pages of all the Sears catalogs (1896 to 1980). I found the 1220 replaced the 633 in the Fall of 1968 and was last sold in the Fall of 1969. The catalog pages showed the pickguard changed in the Fall of 1969, so the 1220 with the “teardrop” shaped pickguard was only sold for 1 year. The 1221 was introduced in the Spring of 1969, which replaced the “Silvertone” logo on the headstock with the “space dot”.
You can read more about it HERE.