c.1900 Lion Brand Flatback Mandolin w/Quartersawn Oak B/S

[Jake Wildwood]

Here's a really sweet little mando that I may be keeping for myself (I'm downsizing/swapping out some of my collection at the moment) as it has tremendous volume, tone somewhere between the warm and rich flatback sound and punchy archtop tone, a slightly longer-than-normal-for-the-time (13 1/4") scale, and totally cool looks. I'm a huge fan of oak on instruments, and when it's quartersawn, all the better!

More info can be found at my blog (click here). (http://antebelluminstruments.blogspot.com/2011/04/c1900-lion-flatback-mandolin.html)

If any of you fellows know more about the "Lion" heritage of this, feel free to weigh in. All I know is that that purfling/binding combination and ornamentation style is very familiar to me on mid-grade catalog L&H guitars of the time.

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[sebastiaan56]

Oh, thats nice!

[Jim Garber]

I am not 100% sure but I don't think this has any connection to Lyon & Healy. it doesn't quite resemble anything that L&H made ... looks more like a Weymann.

Mugwumps has it listed as:


Lion Manufacturing Co..........Rock Rapids, IA..........c1890-1895

Here are some pics of one that was on ebay a few years ago, less ornate than yours.

[Jake Wildwood]

I'd say you nailed it, Jim, and now I -do- remember seeing that style before, probably posted here in some thread or another. I was curious about Weymann when I was looking at it first off, as the body is sooooo deep and has a pronounced pinch after the cant on the tailpiece side, which one finds on old Weys.

Thanks, will post an "update" to that blog post.

[Tavy]

Nice one Jake, I do like these US made instruments you keep unearthing, they make a nice counterpoint to the Gibsons and the Neapolitans ! ;)

[billkilpatrick]

good find - can't wait to hear a sound sample. don't know if there would be a huge difference between a round and oval sound hole but the only flat-back i'm familiar with is the two mid-muddy mandolins i have from mike dulak (m-4 and m-0.) very curious to hear how yours - mature - compares to mine - relatively new.

good looking mandolin as well - complimenti

[Jake Wildwood]

Tavy: Thanks!

Bill: It's super!!! I think I will have to record a clip for everyone. Just put on a set of Labella flatwounds for the G&D and I'm loving the sweet, silky tone I'm getting right now (still tons of chop). Standard wound strings had HUGE chop, though, very good for bluegrassy stuff remarkably!

[billkilpatrick]

you can see a lot of these good looking flat back mandolins up for auction on french ebay - severe temptation in the MAS department.

[Jake Wildwood]

I've attached a little clip of the mando, about a foot away from the mic. This thing's a bit hard to mic as it has a huge voice. Still, pretty faithful I'd say. Note that the flatwounds dropped some of the jangle and punch but gave me reaaaaally lovely tremolo...

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[brunello97]

Nice work as always, Jake. The Lion Brand has been a stumper for me as well, as it doesn't have a strong resemblance to any of the big makers of the time period. The basic body profile does resemble Weymann mandolutes, but that is about as far as it goes to my eye. The use of quarter sawn oak is curious as well. Given the mountains of such wood moving through Grand Rapids-Chicago furniture factories during era one wonders why it didn't show up more often on flatbacks. Sure you see it now and then, often on parlor guitars from the era, but you'd expect the fall-off from making a dining table would be enough for a few mandolins...... I wonder what the price break was back then between rosewood, birch, oak and maple. Is that a single piece back? Very nice. No wonder you want to hang on to it.

Mick

[Jake Wildwood]

Hi Mick: Certainly confusing, and yes, one-piece back, which is really sweet.

I'm a sucker for qtr. oak, for sure, and have always been totally unimpressed with the fact that it's not a popular tonewood choice as the bulk of the oak-back/sided instruments I've played/worked on have been winners in the tone/volume department... all of them quite loud, too. Marketing probably plays a big part in it... qtr. oak is not exotic at all, though is sure looks gorgeous with a mildly stained finish.

[Jim Garber]

Interesting... I just found a that Lion brand was associated with a gentleman named Hobart C,. Middlebrooke. Among a few others, he had this interesting take on fingerboards for fretted instruments.

There was an electric guitar company maybe in the 80s or 90s IIRC called Bond that had a molded fretboard just like that.

[hank]

Sounds Good Jake. Is the Oak solid or a veneer?

[Tavy]

I've attached a little clip of the mando, about a foot away from the mic. This thing's a bit hard to mic as it has a huge voice. Still, pretty faithful I'd say. Note that the flatwounds dropped some of the jangle and punch but gave me reaaaaally lovely tremolo...

Really lovely indeed, sounds sweet, lots of really good bottom end tone as well!

[billkilpatrick]

excellent - lively tone with a lovely, sweet murmur - lucky you!

do you think there are characteristics associated with an oval sound hole which you won't find with a round one?

[brunello97]

Interesting... I just found a that Lion brand was associated with a gentleman named Hobart C,. Middlebrooke.

Nice detective work, Jim. The patent locates Mr. Hobart in Lyon Co., Iowa. 'Lion Brand' wouldn't be a unlikely creative leap. Seems the HS has a similar Lion as their mascot. In the middle of nowhere, so to speak, but a hundred years ago there may have been some there, there.

Mick

[Jake Wildwood]

Hank: Solid.

Bill: I think oval holes and round holes are pretty much the same, though the subjective side of me will tell you that oval holes give more punch vs. round, in the same way that gypsy-jazz guitars with oval holes really cut vs. a round-hole similarly built guitar (many c.1900 steel-strung flattops) which favor bass and warmth.

[JEStanek]

Sounds High Grade to me. Well done, Jake and everyone else for sorting out the mystery of it's provenance.

Jamie

[Brent Hutto]

I played an oak guitar, small bodied 12-fretter, last year that was absolutely wonderful. And hard to find a better looking tonewood IMO. Quite a find there, one of the nicest vintage mandolins I've seen. Sounds pretty good, too. If you like that vintage oval sound.:mandosmiley:

[GDAE]

A little bit more on the factory:

"The year of 1893 was to go down in history as a year of recession--"depression" many people called it. Business was poor--money was very, very tight. There were a lot of business failures and even out in the farming areas the pinch was felt.

Rock Rapids started the year with optimism. The Lion Banjo Manufacturing Company was incorporated and started in business. The firm planned to manufacture banjos, using H.A. Middlebrooke's patent, which joined the head of the banjo to the neck with a metal yoke. This patent had been granted the year before and boosters were sure it would be the foundation of a substantial industry.

The new company was capitalized at $35,000. J.K.P. Thompson was the president; H.G. McMillen the vice-president; F.M. Thompson was general manager; Middlebrooke, the jeweler who had the patent, was secretary and H.B. Pierce was treasurer.

In February F.M. Thompson announced that a lot of machinery was being installed in the factory. This included a Pelton 8 h.p. water motor, power lathes, drills, band saws, etc.

Thompson and Middlebrooke went to Chicago to hire skilled workers and two were hired to move here and work in the factory.

In May a shipment of banjos and guitars made in the Rock Rapids factory were sent to the world's fair. These instruments were outstanding. The Review said they were "made of the most costly and handsome woods-curly walnut and Hungarian ash." August Carlsadt was hired from Chicago to become foreman of the guitar making department for the company."

--Banjos and Booze (http://iagenweb.org/lyon/bookhist/buncombe/banjos1.htm)

[Jim Garber]

Wow, fascinating... thanks for the post GDAE! middle Brooke had about 5 patents in his name, mostly banjo hardware related. I don't recall ever seeing any banjos from that factory tho.

[brunello97]

Great thread. A label mystery solved. My small contribution....a statue of the lion from Rock Rapids High. Looks reasonably similar to the one on the label. Sort of. GDAE, is there any word of the demise of the Lion Co.? 35,000$ wasn't chump change back then, ~850k in today's terms. They had some money to work with.

Mick

[GDAE]

It appears they shut down in May 1895, supposedly temporarily, then briefly reopened when they got a big order, but appear to have filled it from stock in hand. By 1910 Middlebrooke was in South Dakota and working once again as a jeweler.

[GDAE]

Here's an article about the company, written 50 years after its founding.

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[GDAE]

One of the first, and the last, employee of the factory was August Carlstedt. He then started his own guitar factory and built, among other things, harp guitars, including this one http://guitarz.blogspot.com/2010/04/august-carlstedt-ideal-harp-guitar.html

[Jamie-boy]

I know it has been years since this thread was active, but I just stumbled upon it and registered with the Café. I inherited an identical model Lion Brand from my grandfather. It was that instrument that I started mandolining on. I still have it, but don't play it near as much as I should. Thank you for all the information and pictures. Without the pictures, I would not have been able to solve the riddle of my Lion mandolin's ancestry.

Thank you!

Jim

[F-2 Dave]

Cool. Welcome to the cafe, Jim.

[billhay4]

Nice work, Jake, and nice sounding instrument.
Wouldn't it have had more medullary ray flecking if it were quarter sawn?
Bill

[hank]

I was struggling to visualize that pie shape of exact 1/4 cut in such a thin slice. I believe it is still considered quarter cut when horizontal plank cuts to the quartered segment confuse the issue. Jake blows a lot of notions out the proverbial aperture on a regular basis. Wow, what a great all around mandolin. Oak that looks like the veneer on my grandmothers fancy furniture making a most excellent mandolin body.

[hank]

Jake can you tell what the neck and rims are made of? Is the instrument very heavy? In reference to the builder search and the interesting neck. Is the molded neck as steps another way of doing what scalloping between frets does? The recent NORTHFIELD work for Adam S. used deep electric guitar like scalloping. Hmmmm.

[billhay4]

Oh, I'm seeing it now. It was cut on the bias.
Bill

[hank]

Looking back at Jakes info. i see the sides are also quartered oak with a mahogany neck.

[Jamie-boy]

Compared to my Alvarez, I would say the Lion is "Boomy."

Jim

[Jake Wildwood]

Yes, and the oak on the one I had only intensified the bass presence+sustain. That's what I find with oak on most old parlor guitars, too -- granted that the parlors are in good health, otherwise.