Gibson History

In 1936, Gibson unleashed their ES-150, (ES standing for Electric Spanish), and became the first company selling en masse the original versions of the electric guitar. The world of music was never to be the same.

But the Gibson company and brand had already been in existence for over 30 years at that point. The namesake of the organization, Orville Gibson, had been honing his expertise in stringed instruments for several decades before that as well.

Orville Gibson and the Beginnings

Orville Gibson, born in 1856, was a maker and innovator in the mandolin world. From his home in Kalamazoo, Michigan, he made mandolins that were sturdier, sounded better and were easier to produce than their previous counterparts and models.

His design concepts included among other notable elements, arched, solid wood tops and single pieces of wood used for the neck and sides. In 1902 he formed his company, which was in both the mandolin and guitar business.

Early Innovations

The same concepts that Gibson used in his mandolins he transferred to his guitars. Gibson featured the M-5 Mandolin and L-5 Guitar. The mandolin was hailed as being the best ever produced while the guitar model took on popularity in the world of orchestra music. These models were spurred on in large part by Lloyd Loar, one of Gibson’s engineers.

By 1924 Loar was working with electric pickups to pass the vibrations of the strings through a bridge to a magnet and coil, where they were then passed as electrical signals to an amplification device.

This was one of the earliest versions of the electric guitar. However, the concept was not well received and supported by management and by the public, and the electric guitar would not gain widespread public distribution for another decade or two.

The ES-150 and Les Paul

The ES-150 was a project that Gibson was working on for over a year before perfecting and releasing. Charlie Christian, whose name is now carried on the ES-150 model of guitars, helped to popularize and legitimize not only the ES-150 but the entire scope of electric guitars. He truly expanded people’s concept of guitars and how they sounded.

In the 1940s Les Paul was working on his own electric guitar creations. The most notable of which was the solid body wood guitar, something he nicknamed “The Log”. Following Fender’s highly successful sales with their Telecaster, which had a solid body and could be very easily mass produced, Gibson would release their own solid body guitars, under the name Les Paul.

While Paul endorsed these guitars he had almost nothing to do with the designing or creation of them specifically. The first Les Paul guitars from Gibson were released in 1952.

Today, Gibson remains a leader in innovation with guitars and has expanded their portfolio to include a wide range of various instruments. However, Gibson was not without its struggles for survival. While Gibson was supported in great numbers by popular guitarists of the 60s and 70s, the company was extremely close to bankruptcy in the mid 80s.

New ownership and management turned the tide and kept the brand name afloat. Besides the Les Paul and Charlie Christian models, Gibson releases guitars under a handful of brand names including Kalamazoo and Epiphone, with different sounds, styles and targeted ability levels and price ranges.