Posted 8 years ago
richman85251
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The Leo Fender Years (1946-1965)
In the 1940s, Southern California inventor Clarence Leonidas “Leo” Fender (1909-1991) realized that he could improve on the amplified hollow-body guitars of the day with an innovative and relatively simple solid-body electric guitar design. Further, he realized that he could streamline the process of building them.
A born tinkerer, he opened Fender’s Radio Service in the late 1930s as a small repair shop and retail outlet on Spadra Ave. in Fullerton, Calif., not far from where he was born. His interest in the small amplifiers that local musicians brought to his shop to be repaired led to an interest in the guitars that were used with them. Fender befriended one such customer, Clayton “Doc” Kauffman, who ran his own fix-it shop in Fullerton and who had designed and built his own guitar pickups and electric lap steel guitars.
Fender and Kauffman collaborated on their own primitive guitar pickup and test guitar in 1943 (the so-called “radio shop guitar), and by 1945 they were building steel guitar and amplifier sets as the K&F Manufacturing Corporation. Meanwhile, an old friend of Fender’s, Don Randall, had become general manager of businessman F.C. Hall’s Radio-Tel radio and television parts distributorship. In early 1946, Randall suggested to Fender that Radio-Tel become the exclusive distributor for K&F guitars and amps, setting the stage for a legendary musical instruments industry partnership.
Kauffman quickly bowed out of the fledgling company (he and Fender remained great friends for years afterward), and Fender moved the renamed Fender Manufacturing Company to a new and larger factory on Santa Fe Ave. in Fullerton. Fender guitars became known for their clear, bright tone, which stood in marked contrast to the muffled midrange sound of most amplified acoustics.
