When the builder is known or when it is fairly clear that we know to whom the attribution should go, then let the person be known. If there is prior art, then let that come into the light as well. There are numerous cases of one person doing the work and another or several others getting the credit. Let's try to straighten that out here. I have always tried to be scrupulous about the historical accuracy of innovations in lutherie that I write about and to give credit where appropriate. There is a tendency for those with the loudest mouths or the most photo posts on the Internet to get the credit. I don't think that's appropriate here...not that I see it as very much of a problem, but still a casual reader even here might not understand the context of some things that they see.
Just as a for instance here. I may have been the first in these parts to do the straight triangulated flying buttresses; for me that would have been in 1989 and 1990. In so doing, I stood on the shoulders of Steve Klein who was doing a curved flying brace to the headblock and then, of course there was the Fender acoustic of the 1960s with the pipe from head to tail which itself owes everything to Tilton's Improvement of the 1890s.
Adjustable necks? Back at least to Stauffer and his direct disciples like C.F. Martin, Schertzer, and Zimmerman, then on to Howe Orme, KayKraft, August Larson, and now on to Babicz, Steinberger, Doolin, and myself.
CF laminated bracing? In the LMI catalog for decades now.
CF topped bracing? I don't know, but it's pretty logical, and I know I started with it in 2001. Happy to know if someone else did that earlier.
CF topped lattice bracing? I think we have to give Smallman his due though others did lattices. But not Smallman on the arched back for a flat top guitar...that's early 20th Century Gibson, and then Guild among others. Smallman maybe for doing it with nylon strings.
Elevated fingerboard? Boy, did Humphrey get on my case about that; how dare I, and all that. Of course he had no idea that it had been done in the 1820s (though he should have) and that I was basing my design on Howe Ormes of the 1890s.
Arm rest? Well for an add on, just look at banjos. Then there was John Pearse. But as far as I know, it's Grit Laskin who deserves credit for the contoured edge on an acoustic...and doesn't get the credit he deserves.
Wedge body? I think that's a Manzer innovation.
Fanned frets? Too bad Ralph Novak wasted his money on an unenforceable patent. He was about 400 years late on that one.
"X" bracing? Marc Silber has an "X" braced guitar that pre-dates Martin's use of that design.
Of course with many of these and other innovations, there can be several people coming up with similar things at nearly the same time. Patent court fights are made of that. But where we can, I think we owe it to our fellows to attribute things properly as appropriate.
Working with the Museum of Making Music has made me all the more acutely aware of wanting to put designs and innovations in their correct context and to keep things accurate.
Well, maybe this belongs in its own thread, but here it all is...or a beginning, anyway.
|
