c.1930 Galiano 000-size 12-fret Guitar

Talk about your black beauties! This guitar has just about everything a blues devotee could want: funky decals, black-painted finish with cream trim, ladder bracing, the thinner 20s Martin-y style neck profile, a long 25 1/8" scale, and a big old 14 11/16" lower bout. This makes it just a hair under 000-size but that's a pretty big guitar for when it was built. All of these attributes add up to a perfect country blues or ragtime fingerpicker that can range into folk and early country duty, too.

When I originally posted this I was thinking it was an Oscar Schmidt build but now I'm not sure sure. It certainly has an overall design that could be Harmony in origin but there are a lot of OS-style features that confuse the issue.

It's a classy rig, no doubt. I'm pretty sure everything but the saddle, nut, and pins are original to it, too. The finish is nice and glossy and polished right up but shows wear here and there. There are also two or three older cleated/repaired cracks in the top (from the bridge to the soundhole) and back (longer hairline).

This guitar came to me from the Sween Collection with its original nut, but said nut had been hacked up a bit and needed replacing so I popped this new bone on in place.

Other work I did included a fret level/dress, some cleaning, and a good setup. The bone saddle needed to be shaved and intonated -- and it has been.

The fretboard is bound. I'm not sure what wood the board is made of but it may be rosewood or ebony. Either way, it's been "ebonized." The dots are pearl.

I love the rosewood pyramid bridge (it's stamped "Germany" on the front edge). I'm assuming it's original as it sure feels like it. The boxwood pins are replacements but look great with the muted cream of the binding.

I mean, really, it's just a grand old guitar. Thanks for sending it this way, Mr. Scott!

The original tuners work just fine. Black buttons are a plus in my book, too, and also check out how that headstock is bound as well!

I know it's hard to tell in the photos but the neck profile really is much more amenable to modern hands than most of these old OS makes. It has a thinner, 20s/30s Martin 12-fret v-neck feel as opposed to the bigger v or c shape I'm used to from OS guitars. I've noticed that their nicer-quality guits have tended to have slimmer, faster necks compared to the "garden variety" of OS build.

The neck was reset (well) at one point but there's a tiny bit of "ghost" from the steam job when it was done just at the heelcap area. Not really noticeable.

Here's that repaired and filled hairline crack area on the back. Note also the tiny little dots I tried to pick out in the glare on the finish. It's like it either got (a) some overspray by accident or (b) had some sort of liquid splashed onto it and left uncleaned by accident. I didn't even notice this until I was outside in the high glare of a snowy day. Try to see it in the other pics!

There's no endpin.

Along the back edge there's this old repair area near where those other cracks were fixed up. Also not very noticeable, but I like to be thorough.

There's the Galiano label!

...and it comes with a newer, fitted hard case. Nice!