c.1915 Columbia Koa Soprano Ukulele

Here's a fortunate find: a crack-free, great-condition (save for some use wear) Columbia uke made entirely from Hawaiian koa wood, with an attractive orange-red color and strongly accentuated colors. It required a bit of setup and a new set of tuners after cleaning up the finish and reseating some frets, but was otherwise unmolested. It sounds lovely, plays easy, and is pretty loud for a little guy, too. In addition it's a very solid-feeling build so this is a perfect tagalong uke for the beach, campfire, wherever you'd like to go. It'd be great with a pickup for live work, too!

Nice looking koa!


Headstock. Original ebony nut.

Brass frets and yellow-colored MOP dots. Columbias are unusual in that most of them had MOP fret markers, which is kinda nice, if you ask me!

Rosette is simply some light circular cutting of the top.


Grungy label.


Here you can see those colors better.


Really nice looking stuff!


Original bridge in good shape, too!


Side.


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Gotta love the color tone of the wood on this... classic rich koa colors.

Back.


Cozy neck, too!

And a good strong heel.

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And like other Columbias, it has the one-piece side/sides which gives it a very spare, but elegant look.