Loar Picture of the Day

[RichieK]

Tom,
If you didn't have the extra $25, did the Loar come with one of the shaped 'Red Line' cases? Or did you just 'tote it around in a gunny sack'?

[Glassweb]

$250 was a LOT of money for most folks in 1923.

[Lefty&French]

Today is Lloyd Loar's birthday (9th february 1886).

[f5loar]

Happy BD Lloyd. It was $25 if you bought the case with the mandolin at the same time. If not it was $37.50 but you could buy used cases from Gibson from 10% to 50% off the regular price if they had them. The catalog only shows one case for the F5 in 1923. If there was a shape case back then for the F5 it was not listed. By comparsion the F4 shape case was $10.05.

[wannabethile]

let me get this straight. $250 for the loar mandolin?? holy smokes!! its amazing to imagine anything going for 1,000 times its price over any certain amount of years, haha

[Jonathan James]

I heard over the weekend that John Reischman bought his Loar for a whopping $8,000 in '81...

[markishandsome]

I'd always heard he took out a loan to finance that purchase.

[tiltman]

$8,000 was a LOT of money for most folks in 1981...

kirk

[GTison]

prob. about half a years salary average.

[Bernie Daniel]

I bought a pretty decent car for about $8K in 1980 - it has since been "recycled" -- I would guess that would not be the case for the Loar.

[kudzugypsy]

what is more staggering is how much $250 could buy in 1923. the average farm income for a good year would have been $60-75 A YEAR (at that time we were still mainly an agricultural society) - and that was usually all the income a family of 6-10 might make. of course, they would grow their own food. my grandmother said during the 30's, as far back as she could remember, they would subsist on $90 a year and that was a decent living for a family of 5. an old fiddler i use to play with said they could make $4 a weekend playing music then, and you can imagine that was a big bonus.

[Jim Hilburn]

Loar's are often compared to the price of a car so I went Googling and read that a Model T in 1908 was $950 but dropped to as low as $280 before it was discontinued in 1927 so apparently a Loar was very near the price of a new car.

[Darryl Wolfe]

Exactly right Jim - regarding the car prices

$8000 is exactly the price for a Loar in 1981. #I paid $8000 for the one I have in '82 and $9000 for an investment one in 1988 #(75693 above) #Funny part is that Ferns were only slightly behind in price then $6-7K. 3-4 sold in that period for that range of prices

[mandroid]

Any closeup pictures of the signed loar tailpiece covers , just wanted to compare the details of engraved markings and the production marking metalwork techniques.
call me curious , if you want..

[Timbofood]

Now, there's an interesting issue about a tailpiece I would not have asked. Another line could go there but,No.
How about that seriously?

[danb]

Any closeup pictures of the signed loar tailpiece covers , just wanted to compare the details of engraved markings and the production marking metalwork techniques.
call me curious , if you want..

Big one here, another one here,

and here's a favorite shot of the schultz loar one:

[Timbofood]

You know, it's really a delight to have so many of these pictures available. They provide a certain amount of insight into how the old days were "different" and inspiration into how some of that knowledge can be still shared today. Thanks all you folks that save the old bits and share them so freely.

[f5loar]

That has to be the most perfect "patina" I've ever seen on a Loar Tailpiece cover.

[Glassweb]

That has to be the most perfect "patina" I've ever seen on a Loar Tailpiece cover.

Agreed!

[ehb86]

That's a great photo of the "Schultz" tailpiece cover. That got me thinking, did that instrument move on from the family to another owner? It sure was a beauty.

[mandoscotia]

Played a gospel gig last night and had a conversation with Fred, our local bluegrass historian and allround amazing guy. He used to own a loar that he bought in a pawn shop in Halifax for.....$100.

Sold it for much more.

Nathan

[f5loar]

That would have been famous Dave Apollon '23 Loar.
Fred had it a long time before he reaped his fortune.

[Michael Gowell]

Does anyone know the story of how that Loar got to Halifax from Los Angeles? #Seems odd that a fine instrument with a famous owner could go astray like that.

[danb]

Hmm, not enough Loar here lately. Here's a great curiosity, a unique K5 peghead

[danb]

Also the alignment of the F-holes on the body seems unusual to me. Maybe it's the angle of the photo?