Ken Roberts Model: Part II

When I saw this guitar I had visions of Elmo James and Muddy Waters. I bought it at a small estate auction in Bonners Ferry Idaho, where it has spent most of its life. In the case was a hand written letter from Ward Turpin's wife Vivian, both of whom are now deceased. It says that in the spring of 1944, she went from Bellflower, California to visit her husband in Fort Riley, Kansas where he was in the military in basic training. They took a train to Kansas City and bought this guitar. "We paid $75.00 for it which included the case, steel and bar for converting it to standard guitar. I can't think, now, where we ever got $75.00. He was getting $20.00 a month and I was making $20.00 a week". There is also a note and phone number from their daughter (who I can't get in touch with yet.) It says that she has his old cowboy music, so I don't know yet if he was a famous musician/songwriter of the time. I will let you know if I ever find out.

Now the guitar. There is a serial number on the end of the tuning head # C1241. After reading a description of the Ken Roberts model, this one is also joined at the 17th fret, the color seems to be the same and the tag has the "Rickenbacher" spelling. The horseshoe pickup reads Pat. No 2099171. This one has no Vibrola tailpiece, but the one on there appears to be original. In the pictures you see that it has two knobs (1 missing). The one without a knob is the volume, the other one does not appear to do anything. It looks like the pickup has been moved foward at one time because there is a tortoise shell cover where a pickup was. The spot were the cord plugs in looks replaced, don't know what it is supposed to look like. I took the guitar to a friend of mine who plays guitar (very well), he said it played and sounded better than his $4000.00 Martin and it also sounded great through an amp. The case, shown in the photo below, seems to be the original and it is lined with a red curly velvet. The photo above this text shows some of the acessories that were in the case (old Dobro and National picks, a slide, a piece to raise the strings to turn it into a steel guitar, strings and a cord). The strings say they are for a Spanish electric guitar and won't work on a Hawaiian steel guitar. -Curt Bayne