Why Leo Fender Never Acknowledged The Influence of Paul Bigsby

0:00
on today's ask Zack we're going to talk
0:02
about how Leo Fender borrowed this
0:04
Bigsby guitar and how it was a huge
0:07
influence on Fender
0:09
Instruments and how Leo never gave Paul
0:12
bsby any credit for
0:16
[Music]
0:25
that well hello friends and welcome to
0:27
ask Zack today we have this beautiful
0:30
copy of the 1948 Merl Travis Paul bsby
0:34
built guitar it's gorgeous and uh yeah
0:40
and it just inspired me to uh to do
0:43
research and to look into this and find
0:46
out all this crazy information about the
0:49
connection between uh Leo Fender and
0:51
Paul bsby and even you know Les Paul and
0:55
others and it's just kind of crazy how
0:57
all this stuff was happening in Southern
0:59
California in the late
1:01
1940s so we're going to talk about that
1:03
and we're going to talk about
1:04
specifically why Leo Fender never gave
1:07
Paul bsby any kind of credit for the
1:09
huge influence that he was on him and
1:12
the creation of Fender
1:14
guitars so I need to uh thank everyone
1:18
that supports the show my patreon
1:20
members everyone that's done super
1:22
thanks or bought a t-shirt or a coffee
1:25
mug I appreciate it thank you so much
1:30
all right I guess we need to give some
1:31
context first so most of y'all are
1:35
familiar with Leo Fender but you
1:37
probably know a little less about Paul
1:39
bsby so Paul was born at the turn of the
1:43
century you know going into
1:45
1900 and he was a pattern maker which
1:50
meant that he made you know using wood
1:54
first and carving it then he would make
1:55
molds of that and then they would use
1:57
those molds to create metal parts that
2:00
was used in factories and all sorts of
2:03
things uh he did that and he was also
2:06
into hot roding motorcycles and racing
2:08
motorcycles and in fact he won tons of
2:10
races and was a
2:12
star and uh but by the time he was in
2:15
his 40s and it was in the
2:18
1940s he had kind of gotten out of
2:22
racing motorcycles and was doing more
2:24
announcing and hot riding of bikes than
2:26
actually riding them
2:30
and during the 1940s he got into playing
2:34
music and he started looking at guitars
2:37
and Steals and different things and he
2:39
immediately thought you know I could
2:41
make these things
2:43
better now one of the top bands at the
2:45
time was Spade and his band had
2:49
an amazing steel player named waen
2:53
Murphy and Paul bsby loved Spade
2:56
and his band so he went to go see him
2:58
and then he went up to to waen and he
3:00
said I can make you a steel guitar
3:02
better than the one you
3:03
have and he did he made him a double
3:07
neck laap steel with two eight string
3:09
necks on it and waen loved it and used
3:12
it on tons of recordings and then you
3:14
know Paul Bigsby made other you know
3:17
other you know steals for waen and then
3:21
got orders because of waen who was kind
3:24
of a big star of the steel guitar and
3:26
had a beautiful tone beautiful distorted
3:29
tone that you need to
3:31
hear but uh because of you know him
3:34
using that this is how it works you know
3:36
then all of a sudden everyone else
3:37
wanted one too and so Paul starts
3:39
getting a lot of orders including by a
3:41
guy that uh you know ends up being
3:44
called Speedy West and he builds a petal
3:47
steel guitar for uh for Speedy and he
3:50
uses that same instrument on uh on his
3:53
recordings with Jimmy Bryant and
3:54
tennessy Ernie Ford and all sorts of
3:57
cats uh and just to be clear
4:00
you know bsby never invented the pedal
4:02
steel guitar you know that was done
4:04
earlier but he of course did a a version
4:08
of it that was uh very popular and ended
4:11
up being very
4:14
revolutionary
4:16
so let's talk about some other
4:18
characters so Southern California was
4:20
crazy in the late 1940s because you had
4:22
Paul bsby doing this stuff you had all
4:24
these Western swing guys you had Les
4:26
Paul was out there and you had another
4:28
guy who was was an amazing guitar player
4:30
and a singer songwriter and his name was
4:32
Merl Travis and Merl Travis was on
4:36
Capital
4:37
Records and he had hits with things like
4:41
Dark As a Dungeon and 16 tons and smoke
4:46
smoke smoke that cigarette and he was
4:48
also pretty revolutionary guitar player
4:51
and he didn't originate the style but he
4:54
was kind of given credit for it and
4:55
that's why they call it Travis picking
4:58
and he played with a thumb pick and one
4:59
finger and he would play of course kind
5:01
of a Baseline and Melody and kind of
5:03
Rhythm all at the same
5:05
time so at the time Merl was playing a
5:09
Gibson L10 with a pickup on it and a
5:12
Kaufman
5:14
vibrola and old old Travis he really
5:19
liked the sound of the steel guitars and
5:21
he liked the sustain that they
5:24
had so he decided toh to talk to Paul
5:28
bsby about it and he said I want a
5:31
guitar you know I don't want a steal I
5:33
want a guitar that has more of that tone
5:36
and the sustain like a steel guitar and
5:38
so Merl Drew something on a piece of
5:42
paper and in May of
5:45
1948 it was
5:47
done and it looked pretty much like this
5:51
except it didn't have the Cutaway and it
5:53
had a more gangly headstock where
5:55
something kind of went up in this
5:57
direction um but but pretty soon you
6:00
know not long after you know he builds
6:02
it they add the cutway and they change
6:05
the headstock still in 1948 to this
6:08
shape okay they even have to add a
6:10
little wood to kind of get this part on
6:12
there because it you know it went
6:14
up so uh Merl likes the guitar except
6:20
it's kind of bright especially compared
6:22
to his old Gibson so they put a selector
6:26
switch on it with some preset different
6:27
tones on it now this replica does not
6:30
have that on there but uh you know it
6:33
had a three-way switch kind of like an
6:35
Esquire um with some other tones
6:37
available to give you kind of a a rhythm
6:40
and a lead sound all out of a one pickup
6:44
guitar so Merl's playing this guitar and
6:48
he's playing his Gibson L10 and he's
6:52
playing shows around the country but of
6:53
course he's playing shows in Southern
6:56
California well guy named Leo f comes
6:59
out to a show and he asks Merl about the
7:05
instrument says what do you like about
7:06
it what do you not like about it and so
7:09
apparently Leo Fender and Don Randall
7:13
had been having conversations about the
7:15
possibility of doing an electric Spanish
7:19
you know guitar of some
7:21
kind and so Leo's kind of out and about
7:25
and he you know sees the guitar he
7:28
starts talking to Merl and then then he
7:29
says to
7:31
Merl can I borrow the guitar for a week
7:36
now Merl had to think about it for a
7:37
second because this is one of his
7:38
guitars that he's using but he's also
7:40
using the the Gibson L10 the hollow body
7:44
and Merl decides you know what I can I
7:46
can live without you know the Bigsby
7:48
guitar for a week and so Leo Fender
7:50
takes the Bigsby
7:52
guitar and he's a busy beaver because in
7:56
the
7:57
week when he returns turns with the
8:00
guitar to Merl he also has his own solid
8:04
body guitar that he's built it's kind of
8:07
crude but we believe this to be the
8:09
snake headstock you know first prototype
8:12
of the Telecaster broadcaster nocaster
8:15
Esquire
8:16
thing and yes it's crude compared to
8:19
this because Paul bsby was an amazing
8:22
Craftsman who spent an inordinate amount
8:24
of time making these things and you know
8:27
you have you know beautiful birds I wood
8:30
that's used you have all this Walnut all
8:32
these you know Wonderful flourishes you
8:35
have this you know tail piece you know
8:38
here and this armrest all this work
8:42
around the the headstock you have a
8:44
headstock overlay you have not just dot
8:47
inlays but you also have these playing
8:49
card inlays on the neck lots and lots of
8:53
work
8:55
so yeah Leo goes off and he keeps keeps
8:59
working on his prototype and he makes a
9:01
second prototype and on the second
9:04
prototype he copies another thing that
9:07
he learned from this
9:08
guitar and that's how to put six tuners
9:13
on the same side how to have a six in a
9:15
line tuner
9:18
headstock how to get the strings to have
9:21
straight
9:23
pull because that's one of Leo's things
9:25
that he claims when they start uh you
9:28
know marketing the broadcast Caster he
9:30
talks about the straight pull well this
9:32
comes from bsby because bsby is the one
9:35
that figured this out and the way he did
9:37
it was he took two sets of clusin
9:40
machine heads because at that point it
9:42
was only available three on a side like
9:44
you'd see on an acoustic or an electric
9:46
guitar at that point and so what he did
9:50
was he had to take two sets and he had
9:52
to use all of the upper the basside
9:55
tuners and he used uh one of them he
9:59
left the upper part and then on the
10:02
bottom part of the crown he removed most
10:04
of it and then he did the opposite with
10:06
this one and then on the four middle
10:08
ones he removed the crown on both side
10:12
both
10:13
sides and then he was able to fit all
10:17
the tuners together closely and use a
10:19
single screw in between each tuner to
10:22
hold it in place and therefore you're
10:24
able to
10:25
get the tuners close enough together
10:28
where you can get straight string pull
10:31
down through the nut and down all the
10:32
way to the
10:35
bridge Paul
10:37
bsby another thing was a 7 and a qu
10:40
radius people always wonder where the
10:41
seven and a quar radius came on Fender
10:43
guitars well it came from Paul bigsby's
10:47
guitars so with all of this
10:51
um Paul bsby is kind of okay with it
10:54
because Paul is is developing all sorts
10:57
of things he's inventing stuff left and
10:59
right you know and of course Leo's a
11:01
great inventor too but you know Paul's
11:04
not really bothered by it and uh and he
11:08
knows that Leo Fender is more into Mass
11:10
producing so you get up through 1949 and
11:13
into
11:14
1950 and here's where you really get a
11:16
Smoking Gun as far
11:19
as a real admission not from Leo but
11:22
from da Randall the other principal at
11:25
Fender Musical Instruments well at that
11:27
time it was Fender electric instrument
11:30
so uh here is a quote from a letter that
11:35
Don Randall wrote so don Randall was
11:38
visiting a radio
11:40
station and he had one of their Esquire
11:43
guitars again this is in 1950 so this is
11:46
before the broadcaster so this is going
11:49
to be a single or dual pickup Esquire
11:52
maybe Pine and they've got a fender Pro
11:55
amplifier with a 15 and they take it to
11:57
this radio station and joh Randall
12:00
writes a letter about the visit and here
12:03
we go and I quote Merl Travis is on the
12:06
program and he is one of the country's
12:09
foremost guitar stylists he is playing
12:12
the granddaddy of our Spanish guitar
12:16
built by Paul bsby the one Leo
12:23
copied there you have it
12:25
kids so now I want to be fair in this so
12:31
don Randall is saying copied but it
12:33
wasn't a Verbatim copy it was just
12:36
heavily influenced by it and of
12:39
course with you know the
12:43
broadcaster you know you get all sorts
12:46
of wonderful you know Innovations you
12:48
know with you know the string tree that
12:51
he uses the uh you know the way the the
12:55
uh truss rod is installed you have the
12:57
bolt on neck you have the wonderful
13:00
bridge and the pickup that has an
13:02
elevator plate on it so that it can be
13:04
both grounded and raised and lowered you
13:06
have the neck pickup you have you know
13:09
the pit guard you have you know kind of
13:11
the stylized shape the control plate you
13:14
know you're not going to find a bigger
13:16
fan of Leo Fender than me but come on
13:20
Leo you should have given credit to old
13:23
Paul
13:24
bsby now as the years kind of keep going
13:28
into you you know 51 52
13:32
Etc uh you know Paul bsby is working on
13:36
his v v his
13:39
vaba and the reason he's doing that is
13:42
because Merl Travis contacted him and
13:45
said I hate this doc Kaufman vibrola it
13:47
won't stay in tune can you do something
13:50
better and uh and you know Paul bsby you
13:54
know was you know probably claimed all
13:59
the time it says in it says in in one of
14:01
these books that he basically said that
14:03
he could do anything and he he so he put
14:06
his mind to uh to making a better uh vbr
14:09
and he did he made the Bigsby vbr which
14:12
is a huge huge seller of course to this
14:15
day so one of the things he did kind of
14:17
proving that there was no horrible bad
14:20
blood between Paul and Leo at this point
14:23
was in
14:24
5253 he made a specific Bigsby model vbr
14:30
for the Telecaster it was called the
14:32
B16 and it's not like the later you know
14:35
B5 or the things that Fender would do
14:37
later on in the CVS years where they
14:39
took a B5 and they the little plate now
14:42
this uh you know went all the way up and
14:45
the uh the pickup you know was the
14:47
bridge pickup was mounted in it and
14:49
everything uh so yeah so that's what's
14:52
happening in
14:53
53 but things go horribly wrong in
14:56
1954 in 1954 Paul bigsby's had enough
15:00
and that's
15:01
because in the summer of
15:07
54 Leo Fender introduces this guitar the
15:11
Stratocaster and so now the headstock
15:13
shape is closer not further away because
15:16
the Telecaster was enough different but
15:19
this Leo's gone too
15:22
far
15:24
so Paul
15:26
bsby contacts his lawyer the lawyer
15:29
contacts the fender people and things
15:32
get
15:34
ugly Leo's legal council are able to
15:38
show prior usage by showing you know
15:41
photos of old Croatian instruments and
15:43
some of these Martin St stoffer guitars
15:46
where they have six in a line you know
15:48
tuners on one side and Leo is able to
15:55
Prevail and Paul bby's not happy
16:00
and you know of course Leo was not about
16:02
to admit the fact that he uh borrowed
16:05
this guitar for a week and you know
16:07
copied you know features on it and
16:11
learned how to do the you know grind
16:13
down clusive machine heads so you could
16:15
do six on a side
16:17
so so it's not pretty so at that point
16:22
Fender stops offering Bigsby vatos on
16:25
their guitars and you won't see them on
16:28
a Fender guitar again until the CBS
16:31
years so you probably know if you're a
16:33
Telecaster fan that you know of course
16:35
CBS Fender started offering you know big
16:38
bees you know pretty soon after uh CVS
16:41
bought Fender out in '
16:43
65 uh Bigsby keeps innovating and he
16:47
keeps making custom instruments he makes
16:50
cool double neck for Grady Martin and
16:53
and uh one of the really cool things he
16:55
does is Merl Travis loves his bsby
17:00
guitar so much that he wanted uh the
17:02
same neck on an acoustic so bsby took uh
17:06
Merl Travis's you know Martin D28
17:09
removed the neck and put a neck just
17:12
like this on
17:15
it and the funny thing about that is
17:18
that you of course bsby doesn't on a
17:21
couple you know he does on quite a few
17:23
guitars where he reex them well what
17:25
does it look like well it looks like the
17:27
fender Acoustics of the 19 60s so
17:31
another kind of
17:32
blow but again Paul BBY doesn't you know
17:36
he kind of stays a little bit you know
17:39
unhappy with Leo and Merl Travis is
17:41
pretty unhappy with Leo too because Merl
17:44
kind of feels like he's been cheated
17:45
because he basically helped start the
17:49
solid Body Revolution with his
17:51
instrument and he doesn't get anything
17:52
out of it you know he didn't get
17:54
anything from Leo he didn't get anything
17:56
from Gibson either because the only
17:57
reason Gibson makes the Paul guitar is
18:00
because of Leo Fender who only made a
18:03
solid body because of Paul bsby so Paul
18:05
didn't get anything out of that neither
18:07
did Ro
18:09
Travis so things start you know just
18:11
keep rolling on through the late 50s and
18:14
into of the 60s and of course Leo makes
18:16
all sorts of Innovations he makes the P
18:19
Bas he makes the basement amplifier he
18:21
makes you know the Jazzmaster Jaguar
18:24
Jazz Bas you know he he makes some
18:26
killer instruments and does a lot of
18:28
innovation
18:30
uh but by you know 63 or so he's getting
18:33
pretty tired he's getting tired running
18:35
a
18:36
company and he's starting to have uh
18:39
these chronic you know kind of strep
18:42
sinus
18:43
infections and he talks to Don Randall
18:46
and they decide to sell the company and
18:48
so in January
18:50
65 they sell so don Randall and and
18:54
legal Fender sell out to CBS in January
18:57
of 1965
19:00
also in
19:02
1965 Ted mccardy who of course only
19:05
started making less po guitars because
19:07
of Leo Fender and Paul
19:11
bsby goes to Paul BBY so Ted mccardy
19:14
visits Paul bsby in late
19:17
1965 and Paul is way behind on making
19:22
vbros he's very unhappy because he never
19:26
wanted to get into Mass production he
19:29
always wanted to make these custom
19:31
things but everyone wants his
19:33
vbr so Ted mccardy says I'll buy you
19:37
out and Paul's happy to sell and so Ted
19:43
mccardy still head of Gibson at that
19:45
point buys bsby out Lock Stock and
19:50
Barrel Ted mccardy goes back to CMI his
19:54
bosses that own Gibson they offer to buy
19:58
bsby from him because again Ted McCarney
20:01
didn't buy it for Gibson he bought it
20:02
for
20:04
himself those guys offer to give him
20:06
$5,000 over what he paid for it and Ted
20:10
sees the riding on the wall he doesn't
20:12
want to work for these guys anymore he
20:13
just bought this company that he's going
20:17
he knows that he can run better and so
20:20
he gives his resignation and he leaves
20:23
Gibson and runs bsby and does quite well
20:27
with it
20:31
so it's interesting how you know things
20:34
played
20:35
out
20:37
and one of the things that happens you
20:40
know in the late
20:41
1960s is you get Guitar Player magazine
20:46
and you get the beginnings of guitar
20:49
journalism guys like Tom wheeler and all
20:51
these wonderful cats that a lot of them
20:53
have passed on at this
20:55
point but they start interviewing these
20:58
guys guys like Leo Fender and Paul bsby
21:01
and Don Randall and all these other cats
21:05
and they start you know trying to get
21:06
the story and so when they talk to Leo
21:10
Fender Leo doesn't talk about Paul bsby
21:13
and when they say well where did your
21:15
you know where did the solid where did
21:17
the headstock come from and he says oh
21:19
these Croatian instruments he just
21:22
basically mimics you know what their
21:25
legal defense was back in the mid-50s
21:29
and so we don't get the
21:32
truth so yeah so what are the reasons
21:36
why you know Leo never gave Paul bsby
21:39
credit well one is the
21:41
lawsuit the second is Leo was a proud
21:45
man and he was a great man that did a
21:47
lot of great things but unfortunately he
21:50
really didn't like to give people credit
21:52
he didn't like to give his endorsers his
21:54
employees or especially guy like Paul
21:57
bsby credit
21:59
and so he left their names out which you
22:03
know left it open for you know a lot of
22:06
former Fender employees and endorsers to
22:09
act like they were the reason that
22:11
certain instruments or models existed
22:15
and it is what it
22:17
is but you know Leo made some wonderful
22:22
instruments and of course Music Man and
22:25
and gnl and and just continue to
22:28
innovate up until his uh his death and
22:31
uh you know fortunately Paul bsby was
22:34
quite a bit older and so he passed away
22:35
in
22:36
1968 and uh and but all those guys
22:40
really did a lot of important things and
22:42
it's unfortunate that uh bsby is not
22:45
given the credit he deserves you know
22:48
because no the fer guitar was not an
22:50
outright copy of this guitar but there
22:53
were so many things on this guitar that
22:57
were just a huge infuence on Leo and Leo
23:00
owed it to uh to give some credit to old
23:03
Paul bsby and the least we can do is try
23:05
to correct some of that now and uh just
23:09
give credit to Paul bsby and his huge
23:11
influence on the Fender
23:13
guitar I need to give uh thanks to two
23:18
writers and two books that were
23:21
immensely helpful in creating this
23:24
episode first off would be 16 tons the
23:28
Merl Travis Story by Merl Travis and
23:30
deep Dickerson this is a wonderful book
23:33
on the life of Merl Travis one of the
23:35
great singer songwriter guitar players
23:38
and there is a whole chapter on the
23:41
creation of the Bigsby guitar and there
23:44
are the
23:45
handdrawn um you know the drawings that
23:49
that Merl did um you know to for the
23:53
design of this guitar and there's also
23:55
photos of the instrument without a
23:58
cutaway and with the the first headstock
24:00
shape this is a great book also the uh
24:04
Andy Beeks uh book on Bigsby which you
24:08
know this is a wonderful book and that
24:10
gives all sorts of great information on
24:13
uh you know of course Paul's early days
24:16
and as a uh you know racing motorcycles
24:19
and and then of course there's a whole
24:21
chapter on Bigsby and Fender and uh
24:25
really really great stuff so if you want
24:27
to do a deep dive I highly recommend
24:30
that you get these books and I'll put a
24:32
link in the description and hopefully
24:34
they're uh they're all still imprint I
24:36
don't get in trouble with you
24:38
guys all right well I hope you've
24:40
enjoyed today's episode and we'll see
24:43
you next time bye-bye