Electric guitar case, can anyone identify the maker

you'll tell us in two weeks, maybe sooner

 

Geez Ian...ya got me blushin'! Sorry for the suspense. Just wanted BDb to have his shot at buying one of the two I found on Reverb.

The manufacturer is 99% likely Goya. These were produced prior to 67, in 66 and 67 definitely but not later.

It was a challenge. The molded handle was the most distinctive feature, but the best I could come up with there were all produced in the 70's and 80's, the Peavey was closest in shape, the others were some 80's Martins, 70's Gibsons and some other obscure manufacturers...but they were all not even close to the right shape.

I took a list of guitars Syd was known to own, then searched each manufacturer looking at historical catalogues or collector sites, scrolling through all the guitar pics to look for cases, to see what cases they may have produced. I did look at Selmer because they were distributers for Hofners, of which had several. Came up empty.

(I DID come across a fascinating listing of Hofner guitars... for anyone who might ber interested - http://www.vintagehofner.co.uk/gallery/gallery2/arcs.html . Fascinating seeing all the features and development done before/contemporaneously with other manufacturers. The art deco embellishments are awesome!)

I came across Steve Kirtley's site and perused it but didn't see anything in the extensive info he had on case manufacturers that looked promising, but it was so clearly in the realm of geekdom in it's intensity that I thought I'd give him a shout. He replied right away and was a font of useful into giving me several avenues to look at.

Steve is a kindred spirit...like a dog with a bone when he latches on to something. He asked me if I could date the photo. The key to that was Iggy the Inuit, the girl in the picture. She entered Syd's life in January of '67, according to multiple sources, and is the girl in the photo on Madcap Laughs.

She was a rather ephemeral free spirit and although her history was well documented up to meeting Syd, I really had to dig into her to find a reference to when she parted ways with him. Interesting gal. Look up Church of the Holy Iggy for more info.

So once out of that rabbithole with an approximate date of between 1/67 and 8/67, and the composition, which Steve was able to narrow to certain manufacturers due to his knowledge of when certain methods were used, after much scrolling and digging we nailed is as a Goya.

Steve even found one on Reverb for sale! But it wasn't smooth like Syd's, but has a ridge around the top.

While looking at that I noted another among the similar items and Bingo! Smooth with a closeup of the handle which had had a screwed on plex plate with Goya Rangemaster on it. The shape of the indentation on that they handles on these two were a bit rounded/tapered the bottom, so not quite exactly the same as Syd's but there's no doubt it's a Goya, probably an earlier version since they were not made past '67.

That's it, except for the strange markings in the other photo of the case by itself. Sort of looks like 2 in the middle or some circular design..(maybe a stylized G for Goya?) and Steve saw an M in there, but I can't make that out.

Unfortunately none of the examples we would locate photos of showed that side of the case. All of them showed the other smooth side with no symbols.

So I asked the seller on Reverb to send me a photo of the other side. And that's where it lays for now.

 

Ian, please edit the thread title to include "SOLVED" in the front so anyone I kept hanging knows to check back if they wanna know.

Thanks. You stay safe as well. If I get any more definitive stuff I'll forward it to you.

 

Custom-built Peavey.

 

amazing sleuthing! You should rename yourself Sherlock Baelzebub.

 

The devil is in the details!!!

 

Great sleuthing!

BTW: There's a few Goya catalogs on Reverb. This one is from 1968 with the case on one of the pages.

 

I think you go to the thread tools, at the top right(?)

 

Thanks guppy! I saw those on Reverb. Here's a site Steve sent me with a bunch of them in .pdf format. It appears that they started really coming into their own @66 or 67. Catalogues got bigger and went color.
https://www.vintage-guitars.se/Levin/Goya_catalogs.php

 

LATE BREAKING UPDATE!! @Bob Dylan blues

Just as I was diving back down the rabbithole because it bugged me that I couldn't find a Goya case that matched the slightly different handle on Syd's case I received an email from Steve, who apparently, like myself, is like a dog with a bone when gets ahold of something. I'll just reprint his email verbatim:

Mystery solved.


I had a member of the Facebook Vintage Case group respond and tell me that these cases were built by the Polverini Brothers of Castelfidardo, Italy. This was an Italian accordion company that expanded into building electric guitars, and built under various brand names including some Italian Fenders. You can tell that the Goya Rangemaster guitars and other brands are built by them because they have accordion-type rocker switches or push buttons instead of tone pots. So the Polverini Brothers supplied these cases with Goya and Fender logos, and other cases that did not have logos. Apparently the Syd case is one of those with no logo. I imagine that the Polverini Brothers were accustomed to forming plastic to make accordion shells, so building a molded plastic guitar case was a natural for them.


Here’s a link to a 1966 Strat with a Polverini Brothers case. This one has a wooden shell, not plastic, but is that common Italian teardrop shape like we see often on Vox cases. https://www.cescoscornerguitars.com/1966_Fender_Stratocaster_Sunburst.html


I’m not on Strat-Talk. Be sure to tell folks about the Facebook Vintage Case group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/vintagemusicalinstrumentcases


Regards,


Steve Kirtley

Done and Done! Ain't the internet grand?

 

Yes...other than the recessed part around the handle..where the goya plaque is screwed in. The original is squared off. I found lots of pics like this one with the tapered recess...but none with the squared off recess.
That one is probably as close as you can get, unless you contact the Polverino Bros. in Italy?

 

Dude you are AWESOME!!!

 

lol..thanks. Nice to know my skills remain sharp even after I retired.

 

Cool... make it your own. I think Syd would approve. Congrats.