About James Koontz Expertise Acoustic guitar, electric guitar, Amplifiers, Most anything Music related... Also most anything related to security, Fire and access control, as well as CCTV system.
Experience 20 years as a sound engineer, part time luthier, and general all around technical dude for many local bands. One of which was fairly large in the 80's and 90's with multiple recordings, and was the opening act for David Allen Coe, as well as got a nashville recording opportunity. The band disbanded before making it mainstream.
Organizations Loyal Order of the Moose, Boy Scouts,BMI
Publications Highlights for Children, Mystery Magazine,several online Publications, multiple cd's from various artists.
Education/Credentials I have 20 years experience, some electrical college experience. Studied Law, philosophy, and theology.
Awards and Honors well, too many to listm and none worth much more than a paperweight to hold down the ones that are on paper.
Expert: James Koontz Date: 4/26/2007 Subject: Old Chicago Style Parlor
Question I was wondering if you could help me identify a guitar I have? I would need to
send pictures, but don't see how to in this format.....thanks
Answer I would be happy to. You can send the pics to me at guitaranswerman at jkoontz dot com
I'll take a look, and see what we can find out...
UPDATE!
He sent the pictures, and here was my response,
Ok, it is most likely a Lyon And Healy guitar, as you have mentioned...... And The only reference to Regetti, I found, was a small store in the Midwest... Lyon and Healy made guitars for him, as well as Harmony... Lyone and Healy also made some with the Washburn logo and label, for Regetti, Montgomery Wards, and F & R Lazarus.. It is from the early 1900's, probably no later than 1918, as The founder of Regetti's Finer goods died in 1918, and the store closed... THe only thing is I can't verify that the Regetti Finer Goods Company is in fact the one that sold this guitar, simply because I could not locate any images of labels and logos. Fantastic guitar, love the condition it's in.... The problem with these are, there are so many makers who could have made this, I have a banjo, that my Great Grandfather got from the Sears and Roebuck catalog years ago.. I always thought it to be an old Kay.. or S.S. Stewart, but it turned out to be made by Gibson.. So, it's hard telling who made it for sure.. the inlay definitely lends towards the Lyon and Healy brand. But, a tidbit of information, Some Lyon and Healys were also made by the Oliver Ditson company, they made for Lyon and Healy, Bay State, as well as many other names.. It was easier for them to have Ditson(among others) make the parlor sized guitars, since all their equipment was set up for the larger guitars, because at the time, Guitars were getting larger, it was around this time that Martin introduced the Dreadnought sized guitar..So, most manufacturers were trying to concentrate on these larger sized guitars, and contracting out the smaller bodied, less popular sized guitars.. The fact that you asked specifically for help identifying a chicago parlor guitar, does it actually say Chicago somewhere inside? or just on the label, because that is where Regetti's Finer goods was located was Chicago...
