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Serial number 300. Ex coll.: Dennis E. Hartnett, New York. Arne B. and Jeanne F. Larson Fund, 2004. |
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This guitar is based on Loar's U. S. Pat. 2,020,557 (filed 1934, awarded 1935), in which electric amplification is combined with an acoustic guitar body. The design offered a player the option of switching between electric and acoustic amplification, or combining both, with metal posts through the bridge that transfers vibrations from the strings to the bar-armature. With the posts raised, the bridge comes in contact with the soundboard for exclusively acoustic amplification; with the posts lowered to contact the metal bar-armature, both acoustic and electric amplification is engaged, and with the posts lowered completely, the bridge is lifted off of the soundboard and supported only by the bar-armature for exclusively electric amplification. The back of the guitar, made from arched spruce, with two f-shaped soundholes, incorporates another of Loar's ideas, covered more extensively in U. S. Pat. 2,046,331 (filed in 1934 but awarded in 1936), to use the back of the instrument as a second soundboard by transferring bridge pressure from the top. |
Though Dennis Hartnett took good care of his ViVi-Tone instruments (mandola NMM 10809, mandocello NMM 10810, and this guitar), all three show signs of extensive use. Indentations on the bar-armature and wear to the screw-ends of the posts on the guitar pickup indicate that Hartnett also used the instrument for electric-only amplification, in addition to the electric/acoustic set up in which he left it. Hartnett's guitar is preserved with an amplifier (NMM 10812) by Webster Electric Company of Racine, Wisconsin, and an accompanying foot pedal.
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Inscriptions:
Light blue paper label with single-line border, affixed to pickup unit, visible through back bass f-hole, the model and serial number written in pencil: Vivi Tone Guitar / PATENT APPLIED FOR / No. 300 / Manufactured By / Vivi Tone Company / Kalamazoo, Michigan
Spray painted in black ink on head, the word "Tone" reading vertically: ViVi / ▲ Tone
Cast into tailpiece, the word "Tone" reading vertically: Vi Vi / Tone
Stamp on tuner plates: GROVER
Body: Soundboard: two-piece spruce: medium grain broadening toward the flanks. Back: two-piece spruce: fine grain on bass side broadening to medium at the flank, wide grain on treble side; slightly arched; two f-holes; recessed 11 mm from edge of ribs. Ribs: 7-ply plywood, the outer layer birch, the inner layers mahogany, the outer veneer layer grain running perpendicular to plane of top and back; panel on bass side with nickel-plated steel plug; slides out for access to pickup unit. Head: mahogany veneered with white celluloid on both faces. Neck: mahogany; integral with head; rosewood stripe.
Inlay: Binding: white celluloid; black and white celluloid strips on inside edge of binding; on top only. Soundhole: three conjoined circles in top where bridge feet rest on bar-armature; two f-holes on back. Back stripe: none. End graft: none.
Trim: Heel cap: ebony. Fingerboard: ebony bound in white celluloid with scalloped lower end; 24 frets under A and D, 21 nickel-silver frets under G and C; single abalone dots behind 5th, 7th, 9th, 10th (slightly larger), and 15th frets; double mother-of-pearl dots behind 12th fret. Nut: bone. Bridge: mahogany capped with ebony; nickel-silver-plated steel screws to adjust bridge height and pickup contact. Tuners: six nickel-plated steel, worm-gear machine tuners by Grover with convex head surfaces and decoratively cut plate outline. Endpin: black bakelite; extends through tailpiece. Pick guard: imitation tortoise shell plastic raised on wood brace affixed to top with two steel dome-headed screws. Lacquer: dark orange-brown sunburst.
Literature:
Arian Sheets, "Lloyd Loar's Other Instruments . . . Four Rarities from the Workshop of an Electroacoustic Pioneer," National Music Museum Newsletter, Vol. 32, No. 1, (February 2005), pp. 1-3.
