While all of Harmony’s guitars – at least those made in America, as opposed to subsequent imports – were made of solid woods (never plywood), many, especially the little birch ones, are humble and there’s good reason few survived. Let’s begin by tracking what we can of the early days up until the time Sears purchased the company, when its output seems to have consisted primarily of parlor guitars sold mainly through the Sears catalog, though undoubtedly other sources sold them, as well.Īt the outset, let’s stipulate that this subject concerns guitars that span the lower to middle range of the market.

Well, it’s time to make the first attempt at elucidating the vast output of this once-great Chicago guitarmaking kingpin. With such a prominent place in guitar history, it’s amazing no one has studied Harmony guitars. And one of the most successful of those Chicago guitarmaking firms was the Harmony company, an outfit that by the mid 20th century would become the world’s largest producer of guitars. There was a long period of time (late 1800s to 1960s) that mass market guitars were primarily made in the U.S.A., the vast majority built in Chicago. American guitarmaking has evolved since the 1960s into pretty much a high-end proposition. Today we take it for granted that when we want to start learning guitar, we’re going to pick up a shiny new axe made overseas, probably in Asia.

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