Silvertone was a brand developed by Sears Roebuck Company in the
early 30’s.The Silvertone brand replaced
the Supertone brand on musical instruments sold by Sears. The brand was used on guitars sold by
Sears; however Silvertone never actually made guitars. All the manufacturing
was outsourced to various guitar suppliers. These included US manufactures and
US importers. To date there has been no information that confirms that the
Silvertone directly imported directly from guitar manufactures in
This sight will focus on electric guitars made in
Silvertone
Logos
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There were two logos used on Silvertone guitars. The first one
being the word Silvertone painted on the headstock in a thin line. The paint
had no clear coat over it and often has rubbed off over the years. Great care
should be taken when cleaning these guitars as to not remove the logo. The logo was the same design as used on other
Silvertone models made in the
Guitars manufactured after 1965 got a newly designed logo. It’s
unknown who designed the new logo, but the new logo was only used on the Teisco
imported guitars by WMI.
Around 1969 imported guitars sold by Sears began to have the new a
round silver disc. This marked the end of the Silvertone brand on Sears’s
guitars. These guitars were supplied by various manufactures in
Models Supplied by
Westheimer Sales Co.
Westheimer Sales was probably the first importer to supply import
guitars to Silvertone. It’s assumed that a lot of these would have been
acoustic guitars. However they may have supplied some of the early built
Teiscos as well. It is unclear what actually happened because around the same
time Teisco was in the process of changing distributors in the
Models Supplied by WMI
Corporation– (Teisco)
WMI Corporation became the exclusive importer of Teisco built
guitars in 1965. They supplied Teisco guitars to Silvertone during the mid
1960’s. The models supplied were either similar or exact models that were sold
under the Teisco brand. The modifications were often slight, but enough to be
able to identify a guitar as being either a Silvertone or a Teisco branded
guitar.
The models shown below were built by Teisco and supplied to
Silvertone by WMI Corporation. By clicking on the model number, additional
information is available.
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Model 1418 |
Model 1424 |
Model 1435 |
Model 1436 |
Model 1437 |
Model 1438 |
Catalogue No: 57 P 1418 L |
Catalogue No: 57 P 1424 N |
Catalogue No: ________ |
Catalogue No: ________ |
Catalogue No: _______ |
Catalogue No: _____ |
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Model 1487 |
Model 1495 |
Model No: 759-1435-1 |
Model No: 759-1436-1 |
Model No: 759-14371 |
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Catalogue No: ________ |
Catalogue No: 57 G 1495L |
Catalogue No: ________ |
Catalogue No: ________ |
Catalogue No: ________ |
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If you if have a guitar that you think is a Teisco built
Silvertone guitar and it is missing its logo, there are a few things that you
can check to determine if this is your model;
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Firstly
check the model tag. If it has a model number that matches any of the above,
then it is a Silvertone guitar.
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The
second way to tell is look at the logo area and check the shape of any
remaining glue residue in the shape of the logo.
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Check
the nail holes of the logo. Sometimes the logo was nailed on. If the nail holes
match the locations shown on the Silvertone logo, then it is a Silvertone.
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The
sharkfin guitars always had striped guards and the hex pickup adjustment
screws.
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The
1436 and 1437 have the white cover in front of the tailpiece and came with the
black tip tremolo bar.
Tone Controls: The tone dial works differently to modern
and vintage US guitars. The tone knob works backwards. This is based on
filtering of the high frequency. ie Zero being no filtering and ten being full
filtering. The
Other Imported Models by Unknown
Suppliers
There were other imported models that weren’t built by
Teisco. It is unclear if WMI supplied
these non-built Teiscos to Silvertone, or if these were supplied by another
importer.
It’s not confirmed, but Westheimer Sales may have sold guitars to
Sear in the late 60’s & 70’s that were supplied by the Kawai guitar
company. These guitars are often mistaken as Teisco’s however they are not made
by Teisco, even tho Kawai had bought Teisco in 1967.
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(Picture not available) |
(Picture not available) |
Model No: 319-14459 |
Model No: 26133 |
Model No: 319-14059 |
Model No: 319-14560100 |
Model No: _______ |
Model No: _______ |
Catalogue No: ________ |
Catalogue No: ________ |
Catalogue No: 57 N 1405L |
Catalogue No: 57 N 1455L |
Catalogue No: 57 N 1460L |
Catalogue No: 57 C 1440112 |
Catalogues
Because Silvertone was the exclusive brand of Sears Roebuck, the
guitars only appears in the Sears Catalogues.
Unfortunately there is only a limited number of catalogues
available to post on this site. If some more become available, we will post
them in the future.
Links
For more information on Silverstone’s we recommend the Silvertone World web page. It seems to have the most
accurate information available. It covers both US and Japanese made guitars.
Return to Made
In Japan 1960’s Guitars Main Page
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(Last Revised: 25th of June 2012.)
©
2012 MAI Music Publications