Fender Stratocaster, Blonde (1960)

With a combination of super vibey natural play wear, some powerful original pickups, and a level of originality we all hope to see with a guitar of this caliber, it goes as no surprise that this Strat delivers on all fronts. The neck is perfectly worn in, and with a fresh refret done in-house, it's playing better than ever! That's really the only change to the guitar, too.

The original single coil pickups all measure in the low to mid 6k range and sound outrageously good - punchy and warm in the neck and middle positions, with a chimey almost tele-like bridge pickup tone. Cheating the original 3-way switch into the 2 and 4 positions yields those classic double pickup tones, but there's a thicker overall sound happening. Based on the play wear, it's safe to say the guitar was universally held in high regard for its exceptional tone.

The body date - penciled inside the tremolo cavity - reads '1/60' indicating a January 1960 completion date. In typical period fashion, the neck heel shows no pencil date, which was common from early/mid 1959 through early/mid 1960. The underside of the original celluloid nitrate 3-ply mint green pickguard shows a signature from Mell, an employee who worked in final assembly at Fender for years (we also noted a Mell signature on the '59 Strat guard). The wiring harness remains fully intact as well, with clear date codes on the original Stackpole potentiometers.

The guitar includes its original tremolo arm and bridge cover, as well as a rare transitional hardshell case with Brown tolex and the "knuckle buster" latch location commonly seen on Tweed hardshell cases through the late 50s.