The current owner, Richard Smith, lives in Fullerton, CA and it's not a single piece body.
This 1954 Fender Stratocaster is the earliest known example of this model. During this period, Fender serial numbers started with 0100 which is the serial number stamped on the tremolo cavity plate of this exceptionally fine condition example. The neck date is 1/54 and body date 4/54 is located in the bridge pickup route.
1st Production Model Stratocaster Sold for $250K
NASHVILLE, Tenn. March 27, 2014 (AP)
By KRISTIN M. HALL Associated Press
Associated Press
The first production model Fender Stratocaster guitar has been sold for $250,000.
George Gruhn of Nashville sold the 1954 guitar on consignment for owner and guitar historian Richard Smith. Gruhn said Thursday that the guitar was shipped and the purchase finalized this week.
Gruhn, who owns a Nashville guitar shop, says the buyer wanted to remain anonymous, but he said the private collector lives in the United States and is not a professional musician. Gruhn also says he encouraged the buyer to contact the Musical Instrument Museum in Phoenix about displaying it.
"I think it would be great if periodically he would loan it out," Gruhn said. "I would hate to think that it would spend the next 40 or 50 years completely out of sight and not seen or heard."
The sunburst-finish Strat bears the serial number 0100. Although some Strats have lower numbers that begin with 0001, Gruhn says they actually were manufactured later in that first year of production. He says the number-one Strat was originally sold to an amateur who evidently took good care of it.
Smith purchased the guitar from the original owner, and Gruhn said Smith was very pleased with the sale.
The Fender Stratocaster, first produced in 1954, has been described as a guitar that changed the world. Buddy Holly played one. So did Jimi Hendrix, a decade later, when he transformed the psychedelic experience into sound. Bob Dylan chose a Stratocaster for his revolutionary electric set, when he fired a defiant shot at tradition during the 1965 Newport Folk Festival.
That means you're very sane.
I wish luck and happiness to Gruhn and collectors and all.
But a guitar like that is in a parallel universe, not readily comprehensible to most of us.
it's a very special guitar for sure , I can understand why that would be the "Holy Grail" for a Fender collector ..... I prefer stay under 1500.00 myself , only have a couple that cost more than that and most are used and way way under that ...... for my tastes I would rather have the first Broadcaster from G&L , a strat for 250,00.00 would be hard to bring your self to play it for me
Yeah, that IS a chunk of change...but as art...well, I know that some people have spent way more than that on paintings that I'd never want hanging on the walls of my hovel!!!
So lets see- 60 years after its manufacture the very first Stratocaster suddenly shows up for sale and its only $250k!
a guitar that was not worth more than 200 bucks during its first 15 years of existence is in pristine condition and it just happens to have serial number 0100.
I would need some serious provenance to part with that kind of cash for said Strat! Its just too easy for a good counterfeiter to fake the guitar with actual parts .
Does anyone know who came up with the body and headstock shapes of the Strat? Was it Leo? One thing about this guitar, it is like there was a fold in time. This guitar is visually true to the current Strat design as though it was born perfect and never changed more then slightly. Then years later after Leo was done with Fender and Musicman he built the experiments that should have preceded this body. I know there are passionate fans of the Leo era G&L's and I don't mean to start a war but I just don't see the elegance in G&L's until they used Strat/Legacy and Tele/ASAT bodies. I consider the Rampage-ish designs to be carryovers from Leo's G&L experimental years.
yesterday, somebody paid over 2 Million $$$ for Dylan's handwritten original 5 pg manuscript of the lyrics/chicken scratch for "Like a Rolling Stone", written on some '60's hotel letterhead pad. Makes strat # 0100 look like a good deal, at least you can play it, rather than just look at it!
