It was my good fortune to check Gbase about 20 minutes after this was posted: I was able to snatch it up for just $2K, freshly set up and mostly original. The dealer bought it from the original owner, who said the original tailpiece broke; everything else is original, though I was informed that the tuners look suspiciously clean. Apparently, the dealer figured the replacement tailpiece brought down the value by about 50% - suddenly bringing it into my price range. No complaints from my direction.
Noah: Some killer luck you have there. That is so beautiful!! Please make some clips so we can hear it. MD
Great snag! That's an absolutely beautiful piece of guitar history and Hoboken, NJ Guild greatness. Guild during that era was every bit as good as Gibson, and in some respects better! Happy NGD.
Lovely guitar. My friend's grandfather played one and I've been wanting to hunt one down myself for a while now.
Thanks guys! I think I've located a replacement "harp" tailpiece as well; it's not exactly like the original (chrome rather than gold, for one thing), but it should look less visually jarring than that Gibson one. I may look into having it replated in gold.
Congrats! I played one of those babys, and the single coils in that thing are going to make you REAL happy!
