A Lost Fender Guitar Design – The ‘Acoustic-Electric’ of 1965

Looking through some old Fender Guitar Catalogs, I came across this unusual entry.

Behold the Fender Acoustic-Electric as it appears in the Fender 1965 Catalog (see catalog cover at right). I have never come across any record of this instrument before, and yet there it is… photographed… so at least one of them was made.

The Acoustic-Electric is pretty clearly the ancestor of the Fender Coronado, Fender’s ill-fated Gibson ES-335 competitor. The Coronado was sold from 1966 through 1972. There are a few notable differences between the Coronado and the Acoustic-Electric tho – the pickup design, the tailpiece design, bridge style, and the knob/switch placement. We also see a dot-neck on a two-pickup instrument (Coronados had block inlays on the 2-pickup instruments and dot-necks with single pickups), as well as the classic Fender headstock shape rather than the soft lower bout of the Coronado headstock. Taken in total, these small changes seem to represent a deliberate attempt to make the Coronado a more ‘rock/pop’ instrument than the somewhat ‘classier,’ ‘jazzier’ Acoustic -Electric. This change in direction would seem to correspond neatly with Fender’s purchase by CBS. I have to wonder if the Acoustic-Electric represented the thinking of Fender’s old-guard, which lost influence once CBS took charge. Who knows. Anyway, has anyone ever come across a Fender Acoustic-Electric? Or were they all destroyed? Anyone?

chris

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Michael Mason says:

05/04/2011 at 5:57 pm

Yes: in the mid-1970s I spent an hour or so playing a Fender "Palomino" model acoustic-electric in a small guitar shop near Los Angeles — think it was in Venice, CA.
Have always wished I'd bought it, though it had two drawbacks: didn't sound great; was heavy. But good just the same. Bolt-on (and very nice) Fender neck; dreadnaught-type body-shape, slightly smaller than, say, a Gibson Hummingbird size, but full-depth . A_very_ innovative pick-up mount.
I think I recently noted that Fender was/is reviving at least one somewhat similar acoustic-electric model.
Brad Rinkert says:

10/19/2011 at 2:53 am

Fender made a lot more prototype models that never were produced than is generally known. Most buffs know of the Marauder, but there were probably a dozen others.

There was a Telecaster tenor guitar, and a similar instrument which had six strings in four courses, made for Eddie Peabody, a banjo vaudeville artist Leo Fender knew.

There also was at least one Strat with split pickups like the Musicmaster bass and a very different, longer top loading bridge.

I've seen pictures of all of these, in the possession of a music store owner who had several prototype Fenders-of more standard construction-behind his desk. They had ink Fender stamps under the lacquer neck finish stating they were property of the Fender Musical Instrument Co. He would not allow me to photograph these or any of the pictures and drawings he had. I have never seen any of these in the various Fender collector books.