Epiphone started selling their Electar Century amp model in 1939 at a price of $62.25. It was originally a 4 watt tube amp with a 12" speaker. Back in those days, guitarists placed the amp in front of their music stand, so it had rear mounted controls. As the electric guitar took over on the bandstand, the Century became a favored amp among guitarists with its striking furniture grade cabinet that employed figured maple. The Century was endorsed by big band guitarists includi

General Electric has been a big manufacturer in the electronics space for decades. They not only made products for the consumer market like radios, but also products used by the recording studios and radio stations that created and played the music. This was originally a wall hanging 12" speaker used in those studios for monitoring and playback. It likely dates to the early 1940s, as by the late 40s, GE catalogs showed a metal version of this speaker. These were originally d

Cigar Box amps are fun and easy to build, but they just don't have enough substance to be a serious six string guitar amp. I wanted to build something small that would still give you real tone and volume. I started with a beautiful cigar humidor with a marvelous burled wood finish. I added a latch to the bottom which keeps it airtight, but lets you easily change the batteries. It has a 5 watt solid state amp powered by 8 AA batteries. The 8" speaker coupled with the overall h

Danelectro was a very popular American maker of electric guitars and amps in the 1950s and 60s. They also produced guitars and amps for Sears and Montgomery Ward branded as Silvertone and Airline, respectively. My first amp was an Airline 8512 made by Danelectro (see article) and my first guitar was a Danelectro U1. When I started building my own amps, I spent a lot of time on the internet looking for cool designs. The cool shaped speaker cutout really caught my eye. I start

I've always loved the Fender Blackface amps of the early 60s. A vintage Vibro Champ will cost around $1,000, so I thought I'd build my own tribute. This started out with a 6 bottle wine crate and cut the beveled edge on the front top. I added strips of wood to anchor the speaker baffle and the slats for the 1/3 open back. I used a Dremel hole cutter to cut the opening for the 8" speaker baffle and covered it with the traditional Fender silver grill cloth. I added a 5 watt sol

I've always like the look of the vintage Gibson amps. Especially, the EH-150 amp with the great tweed covering, pin stripes, leather corners, stiff leather handle and that classic Gibson logo. I'd love to have one, but don't want to spend $1,000 to get one. So I decided to build one. I started with a 6 bottle wine crate to use for the body and created a baffle for a 10" speaker. I added strips of wood around the insides to screw the front and back into, covered it in tweed

An Airline 8512 was my very first guitar amplifier. I bought it used along with a used Danelectro U1 guitar back when I was probably 11 years old. The 8512 was made by Danelectro for Montgomery Wards and mine was likely made in the 1950s and originally purchased from the Wards catalog. See the shrunken down picture from the 1959 Christmas catalog below - only $39.95! The original had 3 tubes - preamp, power and rectifier and was a 5 watt amp with an 8" speaker. I foolishly

Merson was a distribution organization founded by a man named Bernie Mersky in New York City. The Merson Tempo guitar amp was a tube amp with an 8″ speaker with volume and tone controls. Other manufacturers made guitars and amps for Merson and the Tempo looks very similar to Premier amps manufactured by New York-based Multivox. The most distinctive features of the Tempo is the guitar shaped cutout on the front speaker baffle. I started my tribute construction with a 6 bottle