Orville H. Gibson

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Orville Gibson, studio photography; around the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries Century

Orville H. Gibson (* 1856 near Chateaugay in the US state of New York ; † August 21, 1918 in Ogdensburg , New York) was an American musical instrument maker . His greatest achievement is the transfer of construction principles from violin making to the plucked instruments mandolin and guitar ( archtop construction). He was the namesake of the Gibson Mandolin-Guitar Manufacturing Company Ltd. , today under the company name Gibson Guitar Corporation one of the most famous musical instrument manufacturers from the USA.

life and work

Orville Gibson was born in 1856 (the exact date of birth is not known) as the youngest of five children of British immigrants John W. Gibson and Amy Nichols Gibson on a farm near Chateaugay. In 1881, the young Gibson was listed in the population register of the city of Kalamazoo , Michigan , where he had initially worked as a shoe seller and as an accountant in a restaurant. Around 1890 he had begun building musical instruments as a hobby at home, and from 1894 he ran a musical instrument shop in Kalamazoo specializing in mandolins .

US patent drawing for the form of archtop mandolins invented by Orville Gibson
A 1921 Gibson mandolin in the Orville Gibson patented archtop design

As a recreational musician, Gibson is said to have been dissatisfied with the sound and volume of the mandolins and guitars available at the time. As an autodidact in the field of musical instrument making, he worked on ways to improve these instruments and concentrated on forms of construction from violin making. One of the results of his work was the design for a mandolin, the neck and sides of which were to be sawn and carved in one piece from a solid wooden board. His design provided for this frame to be provided with a carved, vaulted ceiling and floor. In May 1896 Gibson applied for a US patent for this design, which was granted to him on February 1, 1898. However, it turned out that musical instruments constructed in this way were not economical to manufacture due to the high proportion of production waste. As a result, Gibson made the necks and sides of the mandolins he built individually, using curved boards for the sides instead of massive carving. Only the back and top of the instruments were made in the carved archtop design he intended . His hand-built mandolins and guitars became a sales success, and after a while Gibson was no longer able to handle the incoming orders on his own.

In the spring of 1902, five investors from Kalamazoo Orville bought Gibson for US $ 2,500 (around US $ 250,000 based on today's value) the rights to market his name and patent, founded the Gibson Mandolin-Guitar Manufacturing Company on October 10, 1902, and sold it Orville Gibson as a consultant. His role in the company with his name remains unclear; it is no longer possible to determine whether Gibson worked full-time or part-time for the company, or whether he only appeared on the premises occasionally. The first Gibson catalog appeared in 1903 and offered mandolins, mandolas , guitars and “harp” guitars on 32 pages .

Also in 1903, Orville Gibson left the Gibson company due to disagreements with management. He was then awarded an annual severance payment of US $ 500 and a lifelong monthly pension for the next five years. Health problems have already been documented for Orville Gibson's time at the company, followed by longer hospital stays in Kalamazoo after leaving the company. At an unknown time between 1909 and 1911, he left the city and settled in Ogdensburg, New York State. There he repeatedly went to inpatient medical treatment. Orville Gibson died on August 21, 1918 in Hepburn Hospital in Ogdensburg after a long illness at the age of 62. Endocarditis was diagnosed as the cause of death, and his death certificate lists the profession of "musician". Orville Gibson was buried in the family grave of his older brother Lovell Gibson; the burial site is in the Morningside Cemetery in the city of Malone , New York, only about 30 miles from his birthplace Chateaugay.

See also

  • Gibson Guitar Corporation - Legal successor of Gibson Mandolin-Guitar Manufacturing Company Ltd.
  • Archtop - construction principle for mandolins and guitars based on Orville Gibson's patent

literature

  • Tony Bacon, Dave Hunter: Totally Guitar - the Definitive Guide ,
    Guitar Encyclopedia. Backbeat Books, London 2004. ISBN 1-871547-81-4
  • Tony Bacon, Paul Day: The Ultimate Guitar Book. Edited by Nigel Osborne, Dorling Kindersley, London / New York / Stuttgart 1991; Reprint 1993, ISBN 0-86318-640-8 , p. 36 f.
  • Carlo May: Vintage guitars and their stories . In it: Chapter In the beginning was the violin , pp. 30–36. MM-Musik-Media-Verlag, Ulm 1994. ISBN 3-927954-10-1

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Tony Bacon, Paul Day: The Ultimate Guitar Book. Edited by Nigel Osborne, Dorling Kindersley, London / New York / Stuttgart 1991; Reprint 1993, ISBN 0-86318-640-8 , p. 36.
  2. ↑ a b c d e f Roger Siminoff: Orville H. Gibson, 1856–1918 (English) on siminoff.net , 2007
  3. ↑ Carlo May: Vintage - Guitars and Their Stories , p. 33
  4. ↑ a b Bacon / Hunter: Totally Guitar , p. 389
  5. ↑ a b Carlo May: Vintage - Guitars and their stories , p. 34
  6. ↑ Made By Hand: The Story of Gibson Acoustic ( Memento of the original from March 7, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on gibson.com (English) @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.gibson.com
  7. ^ History of the Gibson company ( Memento of the original from April 29, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on gibson.com (English) @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.gibson.com
personal data
SURNAME Gibson, Orville H.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American musical instrument maker and entrepreneur (Gibson Guitars)
DATE OF BIRTH 1856
PLACE OF BIRTH Chateaugay (New York)
DATE OF DEATH August 21, 1918
Place of death Ogdensburg , New York