Just some history...

[FredZepp]

Excerpts from "50 years of the Gibson Les Paul: Tony Bacon" ( with some editing to remain on-topic)

 

The original intention was to keep both the Kalamazoo and Nashville factories running, and that the Nashville plant would produce only acoustic guitars. Unfortunately the new acoustic project allocated to Nashville was the Mark series of models, some of the least successful of Gibson's flattops. After this failure, management decided to transfer the production of the bulk of the Les Paul line, by far the most successful Gibson solidbodies at the time.

Kalamazoo had always been what is known technically as a "soft tool" factory. This means that the machines and fixtures used to make the guitars could be modified and adapted at will, as circumstances dictated. In other words, things could be changed easily. Nashville started life as a "hard tool" facility, which means that it had a lot of heavy machines and fixtures on which the settings were never changed. So it was that the character of the two factories that Gibson ran during the remaining years of the 1970s and into the early 1980s was quite different.

Nashville was set up to produce very large quantities of a handful of individual models , where Kalamazoo was more flexible and had the potential to specialize in small runs. Nashville was therefore the obvious choice to produce the highest volume models in Gibson's solidbody line at the time - the Les Paul Custom and Les Paul Deluxe- along with various other solid models.

 

In the 1970s, some US dealers who specialized in older instruments began to order from Gibson's Kalamazoo plant selected Les Pauls with "vintage correct" appointments. Since the onset of Gibson's new Nashville factory in 1975 the original Kalamazoo plant had leaned more heavily toward shorter, specialized runs of guitars. Jim Deurloo, by the early 1980s plant manager at Kalamazoo, remembers dealers such as Leo's of California, Jimmy Wallace of Texas, and Guitar Trader of New Jersey ordering special vintage-style Les Paul Standards. These dealers and their customers were looking for features such as an exact old-style carving shape and a particular neck feel, as well as a number of small visual details - and Kalamazoo provided an approximation.

 

A typical ad for these dealer specials came in Guitar Traders May 1982 newsletter, " Guitar Trader and Gibson announce the ultimate Les Paul reissue" , claimed the blurb, alongside a repro of the original Standard entry from Gibsons 1960 catalog. A list of features followed: "Dimensions as per 1959 model shown".... These instruments will be produced in strictly limited quantities at the original Gibson factory in Kalamazoo, MI and represent a special investment value. Guitar Trader added that if you ordered your "59 Flametop" immediately for summer '82 delivery they would install original 1950's Patent Applied For pickups, subject to availability.

 

Jim Deurloo recalled that dealer specials like the Guitar Trader instruments were selected from the production line at Gibson, but were custom built to some degree. " I remember that Guitar Trader selected each top, and they were very picky about the color."

 

Meanwhile, the head of R&D managed to persuade Norlin to put a vintage-flavored Les Paul into production, the Heritage series Les Pauls. But not as a standard Les Paul, however, but rather as separate, premium items, touted as "limited editions" and not included on the company's general pricelist. In 1982 , Kalamazoo put out the limited-run Les Paul Standard 82, distinguished from the Heritage Standard 80 primarily by its one-piece neck and the fact that it was made in Kalamazoo.

 

In July 1983 Gibson president Marty Locke informed Jim Deurloo that the Kalamazoo plant would close. The last production at Kalamazoo was in June 1984, and the plant closed three months later, after more than 65 years of worthy service since the original building had been erected by Gibson.

Tim Shaw recalls, "Jim Deurloo, to his credit, fought a hard battle to keep Kalamazoo open, and he lost. When the announcement came down, he got the entire factory together and said look , they've made the decision to close this place. You people have been with the company for a long time and I'm very sorry that it worked out this way. But you're all professionals, you've worked here a long time, you have a heritage to be proud of, and as we downsize and close I want you to remain professionals.

Some of the key people were offered positions at Nashville. But Deurloo, together with Marv Lamb, who'd been with Gibson since 1956, and J P Moats, a Gibson employee of equally long standing, decided to leave. They rented part of the Kalamazoo plant and started the Heritage guitar company in April 1985. As Marv Lamb puts it, " we all grew up building guitars and we didn't know too different. We could have searched for another job, but we wanted to do what we know how to do best..."

[smurph1]

Excerpts from "50 years of the Gibson Les Paul: Tony Bacon" ( with some editing to remain on-topic)

 

The original intention was to keep both the Kalamazoo and Nashville factories running, and that the Nashville plant would produce only acoustic guitars. Unfortunately the new acoustic project allocated to Nashville was the Mark series of models, some of the least successful of Gibson's flattops. After this failure, management decided to transfer the production of the bulk of the Les Paul line, by far the most successful Gibson solidbodies at the time.

Kalamazoo had always been what is known technically as a "soft tool" factory. This means that the machines and fixtures used to make the guitars could be modified and adapted at will, as circumstances dictated. In other words, things could be changed easily. Nashville started life as a "hard tool" facility, which means that it had a lot of heavy machines and fixtures on which the settings were never changed. So it was that the character of the two factories that Gibson ran during the remaining years of the 1970s and into the early 1980s was quite different.

Nashville was set up to produce very large quantities of a handful of individual models , where Kalamazoo was more flexible and had the potential to specialize in small runs. Nashville was therefore the obvious choice to produce the highest volume models in Gibson's solidbody line at the time - the Les Paul Custom and Les Paul Deluxe- along with various other solid models.

 

In the 1970s, some US dealers who specialized in older instruments began to order from Gibson's Kalamazoo plant selected Les Pauls with "vintage correct" appointments. Since the onset of Gibson's new Nashville factory in 1975 the original Kalamazoo plant had leaned more heavily toward shorter, specialized runs of guitars. Jim Deurloo, by the early 1980s plant manager at Kalamazoo, remembers dealers such as Leo's of California, Jimmy Wallace of Texas, and Guitar Trader of New Jersey ordering special vintage-style Les Paul Standards. These dealers and their customers were looking for features such as an exact old-style carving shape and a particular neck feel, as well as a number of small visual details - and Kalamazoo provided an approximation.

 

A typical ad for these dealer specials came in Guitar Traders May 1982 newsletter, " Guitar Trader and Gibson announce the ultimate Les Paul reissue" , claimed the blurb, alongside a repro of the original Standard entry from Gibsons 1960 catalog. A list of features followed: "Dimensions as per 1959 model shown".... These instruments will be produced in strictly limited quantities at the original Gibson factory in Kalamazoo, MI and represent a special investment value. Guitar Trader added that if you ordered your "59 Flametop" immediately for summer '82 delivery they would install original 1950's Patent Applied For pickups, subject to availability.

 

Jim Deurloo recalled that dealer specials like the Guitar Trader instruments were selected from the production line at Gibson, but were custom built to some degree. " I remember that Guitar Trader selected each top, and they were very picky about the color."

 

Meanwhile, the head of R&D managed to persuade Norlin to put a vintage-flavored Les Paul into production, the Heritage series Les Pauls. But not as a standard Les Paul, however, but rather as separate, premium items, touted as "limited editions" and not included on the company's general pricelist. In 1982 , Kalamazoo put out the limited-run Les Paul Standard 82, distinguished from the Heritage Standard 80 primarily by its one-piece neck and the fact that it was made in Kalamazoo.

 

In July 1983 Gibson president Marty Locke informed Jim Deurloo that the Kalamazoo plant would close. The last production at Kalamazoo was in June 1984, and the plant closed three months later, after more than 65 years of worthy service since the original building had been erected by Gibson.

Tim Shaw recalls, "Jim Deurloo, to his credit, fought a hard battle to keep Kalamazoo open, and he lost. When the announcement came down, he got the entire factory together and said look , they've made the decision to close this place. You people have been with the company for a long time and I'm very sorry that it worked out this way. But you're all professionals, you've worked here a long time, you have a heritage to be proud of, and as we downsize and close I want you to remain professionals.

Some of the key people were offered positions at Nashville. But Deurloo, together with Marv Lamb, who'd been with Gibson since 1956, and J P Moats, a Gibson employee of equally long standing, decided to leave. They rented part of the Kalamazoo plant and started the Heritage guitar company in April 1985. As Marv Lamb puts it, " we all grew up building guitars and we didn't know too different. We could have searched for another job, but we wanted to do what we know how to do best..."

I LOVE that last section..almost brings a tear to my eye..I grew up in Michigan, and I was always proud that the World Famous Gibson guitar was built there..and now our beloved Heritages.. thanks for sharing..

[Steiner]

Excellent work Sir Zepp!

[chico]

Excellent work Sir Zepp!

 

 

ditto

[barrymclark]

Great piece on great music history.

[Guido]

Great info!

 

Thanks for sharing.

 

Guido

[zookroo1]

Cool article. Jim's speech at the end sounds like it comes from a movie...

[pegleg32]

Great post Fred. Always fun to hear a little of the Heritage history and see how these folks played a part in the early Gibson story. Knowing that I have two guitars that were personally signed by these guys makes them really special.

[Dick Seacup]

Fantastic. Thanks for posting that!

[jmc7581]

Totally fascinating. Great post.

[kbp810]

Totally fascinating. Great post.

I agree, great post!

 

I know the basic story, but it's always great to learn more and more about how it really all went down.

[FredZepp]

I am glad that you all enjoyed the post... here's just a bit more that I had posted once before...

 

Excerpt from " The Gibson Guitar Book"- Walter Carter

 

The heart and soul of Gibson was still at 225 Parsons St. in Kalamazoo, where the core group of guitar builders had stayed, and in 1983 Mary Locke told Jim Deurloo that he planned to close the Nashville plant. Apparently that was a riskier option than closing the Kalamazoo plant and , according to Deurloo, within three weeks one of Locke's strongest supporters at the Norlin corporate level left the company and Locke reversed himself. He announced that the Kalamazoo plant would close and all production would move to Nashville.

 

In June 1984, the last Gibson guitars left the loading dock of 225 Parsons St.

 

If there was still any magic or mystique about Gibson in Kalamazoo, it remained there, as many Kalamazoo employees refused to uproot their families for an insecure future in Nashville.

Among those were four key Gibson employees - Jim Deurloo, J.P. Moats, Bill Paige and Marv Lamb - who stayed not only in Kalamazoo but in the Parsons St. factory, where they formed the Heritage guitar company and found success as the company that, more than Gibson, continued the Gibson tradition.

 

 

>this is from a book about Gibson ...>

 

"The heart and soul of Gibson was still at 225 Parsons St. in Kalamazoo, where the core group of guitar builders had stayed"

 

"they formed the Heritage guitar company and found success as the company that, more than Gibson, continued the Gibson tradition."

 

 

--------------------

[skydog52]

Thanks for sharing. It really drives home the great name they picked.

Heritage = Great instruments.

[GuitArtMan]

Great story. You should post this over at the Les Paul Forum.

[212Mavguy]

Great story. You should post this over at the Les Paul Forum.

 

I agree...FWIW

[FredZepp]

Great story. You should post this over at the Les Paul Forum.

I doubt that it would create the same warm feelings over there....

[High Flying Bird]

Gotta love the story every time you hear it. I have been up there two years in a row. I am still shaking saw dust out of my knickers. It feels good.

[yoslate]

Thanks, Fred! Nice read, and just another iteration of what we all know, and are reminded of, every time we pick up any one of our pieces!

[brentrocks]

Great find Fred!!!!

[conorb]

Very informative.

 

Thanks!

 

conorb

[bolero]

great post & bit of history, thx guys

 

I raise a pint of Canadian brew to the crew at Heritage gtrs!!

 

[BMG]

Can't wait for PSPIII. It will be my first time but reading this stirs the emotions even more!!!

 

Thanks for sharing. Great Article!

[sbtills]

Thanks for your post. That is a great, well written synopsis of the events of the eighties. Great read.

 

I recently have gotten to know the people at the factory a little bit and could not be more impressed. I got to know Marvin the best, and you couldn't meet a nicer and more knowledgeable gentleman.

[hiro]

It makes me glad I found out about Heritage before saving up for a Gibson before

 

A) spending money on a guitar company that screwed its aces

 

B ) spending lots of money on a guitar that has the name and branding, but not the workmanship the branding was built upon

 

C) buying something that was produced for a market as opposed to made with the intention of someone's going to play this and they will get the best we can do.

 

D) realizing a labor of love, built to closer specs than current LP's, and alot cheaper and more quality than the LP itself

[pro-fusion]

This story illustrates the key difference between Kalamazoo and Nashville. The K'zoo factory *all along* was set up to build special guitars made by dedicated craftsmen. Nashville was set up to be the guitar equivalent of a widget factory. And I think we can all see how that turned out.