Bacon & Day Senorita S-1 Flat Top Acoustic Guitar (1935)
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Item #6034
Bacon & Day Senorita S-1 Model Flat Top Acoustic Guitar, c. 1935, made in Chicago, serial # 123, sunburst lacquer finish, mahogany back and sides, spruce top; mahogany neck with rosewood fingerboard, black tolex hard shell case.
A lovely example of a very rare flat top guitar. This Bacon & Day Senorita S-1 was built in the mid-1930's when the Bacon Banjo Company was on its last legs, a victim of both the lingering depression and the declining market for banjos. While the guitar itself was made by Regal in Chicago the decorative engraved celluloid headstock is pure Bacon. Bacon & Day instruments were always top quality and this guitar ranks with the finest Chicago-made guitars of the era.
Although the Bacon company built many of the finest and most expensive banjos of the 1920's they had no experience, or apparent interest, in building guitars. They had dabbled with ukuleles and mandolins in the early 1920's and had even sold a few Martin guitars with a Bacon stamp, but in the main had been able to prosper with a banjo-only line. When the high-end banjo market collapsed in the late 1920's Fred Bacon and David Day, both older men with decades of experience in the music business, took the expedient route and contracted with outside makers to supply them with guitars that could be finished off as "B&D's". While similar to other Regal-built instruments including the Tonk Bros. Washburn line these "B&D" guitars are always distinctively appointed, and also the best that could be had.
This B&D Senorita S-1 was by 1937 one of the company's very few flat-tops -the company's main promotional efforts were given to "orchestral" archtop guitars. The light spruce top is X-braced and single bound, with multiple binding on the soundhole edge. The bridge is a standard pattern rectangle with an offset saddle, much like the 1930's Gibson style. There is a very nice tortoise celluloid pickguard of typical Regal style.
All 1930's Bacon guitars are quite rare. They are considered very collectible, both for their inherent quality and due to a longtime association with John Fahey, who played a Ne Plus Ultra flattop extensively in the 1960's. This Senorita is a unique and great playing and sounding guitar with a clean and powerful tone, is the only example of this particular model we have ever seen.
Overall length is 40 1/2 in. (102.9 cm.), 14 1/8 in. (35.9 cm.) wide at lower bout, and 4 1/8 in. (10.5 cm.) in depth at side, taken at the end block. Scale length is 25 in. (635 mm.). Width of nut is 1 13/16 in. (46 mm.). A nicely original guitar overall; some repairs but a very fine playing and sounding instrument. The neck has been reset and the bridge taken down slightly, new nut and saddle and it appears to have been nicely refretted some time back. There is an old repaired crack on the side just above the heelblock that is not as neatly done as we would prefer but solid. Otherwise nicely original, there are nicks and dings overall but no major finish loss except to the back of the neck in the area of the frst few frets, where an old capo did its work. This is a superbly light instrument with a very resonant sound, an exceptionally fine pre-WWII Regal-made guitar. Excellent - Condition.
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A lovely example of a very rare flat top guitar. This Bacon & Day Senorita S-1 was built in the mid-1930's when the Bacon Banjo Company was on its last legs, a victim of both the lingering depression and the declining market for banjos. While the guitar itself was made by Regal in Chicago the decorative engraved celluloid headstock is pure Bacon. Bacon & Day instruments were always top quality and this guitar ranks with the finest Chicago-made guitars of the era.
Although the Bacon company built many of the finest and most expensive banjos of the 1920's they had no experience, or apparent interest, in building guitars. They had dabbled with ukuleles and mandolins in the early 1920's and had even sold a few Martin guitars with a Bacon stamp, but in the main had been able to prosper with a banjo-only line. When the high-end banjo market collapsed in the late 1920's Fred Bacon and David Day, both older men with decades of experience in the music business, took the expedient route and contracted with outside makers to supply them with guitars that could be finished off as "B&D's". While similar to other Regal-built instruments including the Tonk Bros. Washburn line these "B&D" guitars are always distinctively appointed, and also the best that could be had.
This B&D Senorita S-1 was by 1937 one of the company's very few flat-tops -the company's main promotional efforts were given to "orchestral" archtop guitars. The light spruce top is X-braced and single bound, with multiple binding on the soundhole edge. The bridge is a standard pattern rectangle with an offset saddle, much like the 1930's Gibson style. There is a very nice tortoise celluloid pickguard of typical Regal style.
All 1930's Bacon guitars are quite rare. They are considered very collectible, both for their inherent quality and due to a longtime association with John Fahey, who played a Ne Plus Ultra flattop extensively in the 1960's. This Senorita is a unique and great playing and sounding guitar with a clean and powerful tone, is the only example of this particular model we have ever seen.
Overall length is 40 1/2 in. (102.9 cm.), 14 1/8 in. (35.9 cm.) wide at lower bout, and 4 1/8 in. (10.5 cm.) in depth at side, taken at the end block. Scale length is 25 in. (635 mm.). Width of nut is 1 13/16 in. (46 mm.). A nicely original guitar overall; some repairs but a very fine playing and sounding instrument. The neck has been reset and the bridge taken down slightly, new nut and saddle and it appears to have been nicely refretted some time back. There is an old repaired crack on the side just above the heelblock that is not as neatly done as we would prefer but solid. Otherwise nicely original, there are nicks and dings overall but no major finish loss except to the back of the neck in the area of the frst few frets, where an old capo did its work. This is a superbly light instrument with a very resonant sound, an exceptionally fine pre-WWII Regal-made guitar. Excellent - Condition.
