A Little Guitar

I learned to play the guitar when I was about 13 –8th grade. My family had a 3rd or 4th hand acoustic guitar originally bought for my older brother, but since he was left-handed, it just laid around unused for a couple of years.

I had a Beatles song book and I had all the Beatles records (and loved them) so that was my stimulus to learn to play. The guitar wasn’t easy to play, but I was determined. I even persevered when I broke the high E string and didn’t have any means to get a replacement (I was just a kid in a small town and had no idea how to go about getting a replacement). I just adjusted my chords so they didn’t use the high string.

After learning the basics, and being determined to stick with it, I really longed for an electric guitar. Eric Clapton had one. Carlos Santana had one. Jimi Hendrix had one. I really needed one!

Then I saw it — the perfect guitar.

On the inside back page of most comic books were lots of novelty items for sale. X-ray Specs

and joke gum and soap and other pranks. But there was also an electric guitar — and it was just my price.

The picture was a simple drawing of a guitar and the price was $10. True, this was 50 years ago, but that was still cheap for such a guitar.

I took some money that I earned from my paper route and sent away for it.

About a week later, I got a letter (everything went through snail mail in those days — you wouldn’t understand). It was from the company and they had bad news for me — the guitar I ordered was out of stock.

But wait! They had another model, slightly more expensive but much better. It was the same except for the addition of a tremolo bar (what a lot of people call a “whammy bar” today). It would cost a whole $5 more!

I didn’t mind… all the better. It would be the best guitar ever.

I couldn’t wait.

I will spare you the dramatic scene where I’m pacing the floor and impatient. Needless to say, one terrific day, I got a card in the mail. The post office was holding a package of me and I had to come down and pick it up because they couldn’t deliver it to our door.

I wasted no time at all. I went to the window and presented my card and tried to stay calm as the clerk disappeared into the back room to retrieve my package.

And when he returned and pushed the box through the window at the counter, I was puzzled. It was little larger than a shoe box.

I opened the box when I got outside and pulled out an electric guitar with a tremolo bar — cherry red and perfectly proportioned. But only about 18-inches long (if that).

I can’t tell you what went through my mind, but it was probably the 13-year old’s equivalent of “I’ve been screwed!”

The illustration in the advertisement had nothing to compare for scale. If they had shown that guitar and, maybe a ruler beside it, I would have known. But like most customers, I’m sure, I just assumed that I was getting a regulation adult-sized guitar.

What could I do? Technically, it was everything advertised. True, it was cheaply made. I don’t think the tremolo bar survived more than two uses before breaking off. The following Christmas, my brother Craig would get an electric bass and I would get a real, full-sized Sears Silvertone guitar with a 5-watt amplifier that we both plugged into. I tried plugging in my little electric guitar and the wiring was so shoddy that it just clicked and scratched and cut out.

Brother Craig, looking on the bright side, thought we could work it into our act. He could ask me if I was learning to play the guitar and I could say, “Yeah, I play a little guitar.” And then produce the instrument.

I kept that real guitar for many years. I don’t know what eventually happened to it, but my only hope is that it one day becomes valuable as the first electric guitar of the Famous Wade B Ward.

Now I just have to get famous.