The son of a renowned German luthier, Rossmeisl immigrated to the United States in 1953, bringing his flamboyantly innovative design sense and peerless expertise in archtop guitar construction with him. He told Leo, in essence, “I’m here, and I’m going to start working for you.” Leo liked Roger’s cocky self-assured manner, admired his work, and saw the opportunity to put the Fender mark on acoustic guitars. The acoustic chapter of Fender history begins in earnest with the early 1962 arrival of master luthier Roger Rossmeisl, a former Rickenbacker guitar designer and builder, who quite literally showed up one day at Leo Fender’s office, as author Richard Smith recalls in Fender: The Sound Heard ’Round the World:Ĭonfident he could make a job for himself in Leo’s expanding universe, Rossmeisl had already moved to Fullerton. Hall and Don Randall that was the predecessor of Randall’s future Fender Sales organization, but it would be well more than a decade before acoustic guitars bearing the Fender name would appear. Several inexpensive acoustic guitar models were offered in the late 1940s by Radio-Tel, the Santa Ana, Calif., distributor run by F.C. Folk music was booming in the late 1950s and early 1960s, and acoustic guitars remained an integral part of rock, country and pop. Most of all, Fender acoustic guitars were fun.Īnd back in the day, some pretty heavy hitters used them, from rock strummers to country pickers-artists such as Johnny Cash, George Jones, Buck Owens, Tex Ritter, Wanda Jackson, Charley Pride, Ray Davies, Robbie Robertson and Elvis Presley.Īfter the phenomenal success of Fender electric guitars, basses and amplifiers in the late 1940s and throughout the 1950s, it seemed only natural that rapidly growing Fender would turn its attention to the acoustic guitar world. Fender acoustics were good-sounding, cool-looking and solidly built instruments, as seen in the classic Fender advertisements of the 1960s. A Fender acoustic guitar was for throwing in the car and hitting the beach. It wasn’t for the hushed classical concert stage or for hanging over the fireplace. Fender’s rich acoustic guitar history dates back to the early 1960s, when the company injected a much-needed dose of modernity and youthfully exuberant Southern California sun-and-fun culture into the old world of acoustic guitar design.Ī Fender acoustic guitar was not one for which you dressed formally or that you displayed as a valuable relic.
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