I saw the “Josie” Tele by Sadowsky in the online catalogue and how it appeared in bad shape. I thought I might be able to snag it with my $2800 budget. I watched some of Friday’s auction on my laptop to get a feel of how it worked. On Saturday I eagerly placed some bids on the Josie guitar and some pedal boards. When the guitar came up I had my finger hovering with the cursor over the bid button. Suddenly the bids rolled in and I barely got my cursor away without accidentally bidding $20,000! I was blown away by the prices for the pedal boards, too.
Well I already had the fever for a Tele type, being mostly an archtop guy, but always hearing how Tele’s made great jazz guitars. I looked ahead in the catalogue and saw a NoCaster Tele type made by 30th Street Guitars in NYC. I bid on it and got it at my budget. Boy did I hit the jackpot. It plays like butter. There is a date in the neck pocket indicating it was built in 1988. Walter definitely loved this guitar, too. There is quite a bit of fret wear, the volume pot is worn out, and there is a sticker on the headstock, “10’s”, that I presume was put there by his guitar tech. The headstock has two scorch marks along each side of the 6th string tuner where Walter slid his Camel regulars under the string. There definitely was some WB mojo flowing through this piece of wood. I tried emailing 30th Street Guitars asking if they could tell me anything about the guitar and got a terse response that seems very NYC… “Without the guitar in hand, I don't really recall. Built a lot of guitars for Walter over the years. He was a regular customer.”
I have played guitar for 55 years and have a small collection of player’s guitars. WB’s guitar will join the group comprised of a Mortoro guitar that was George Benson’s, Billy Bean’s ES-175, and Tommy Tedesco’s ES-175.
Still flushed with WB vibes, I also picked up a couple of Greer Amps pedals from the WB Estate on-line only auction on Dec. 9! I’m eagerly waiting for those to arrive.
https://www.jazzguitar.be/forum/guitar-amps-amp-gizmos/76811-walter-beckers-1952-telecaster-replica-30th-street-guitars-nyc.html