July 2013
1961 Epiphone Casino
This 1961 Epiphone Casino was a near twin to Gibson’s ES-330. Gibson had purchased Epiphone four years before this guitar rolled off the assembly line. Like its counterpart, the ES-330, the Casino has a thin, yet completely hollow body. The early Royal Tan Epiphone Casino here has features that distinguish it from later models. The headstock, like on all of the earliest Casinos, appears a little wider than a typical Gibson headstock with slightly different top curves. By 1963, it had become more elongated and narrower by the D- and B-string tuners. The dot fingerboard inlays on this early version would change to a wider parallelogram shape by ’62. The black plastic P-90 pickup covers were changed to metal covers by ’63. The 3-ply, white-black-white pickguard remained standard until the end of the model’s original run in 1970.
Original price: $314.50 plus $50 for hardshell case in 1961â?¨
Current estimated market value: $4,500
We’ve compiled an abbreviated gallery of all the vintage gear highlighted last year by Laun Braithwaite, Tim Mullally, and Dave Rogers of Dave’s Guitar Shop in their monthly column, Vintage Vault. To read the larger history of these instruments, visit the “Vintage Vault” section by clicking here or navigating under the Premier Blogs tab above for the full monty.
