Kings Of Country

We take a look at Gibson’s ‘king of the flat-tops’ with Walter Carter, author of the spec check bible Gruhn’s Guide To Vintage Guitars and proprietor of Carter Vintage Guitars in Nashville, Tennessee

- Rod Brakes

Beginning life as a custom order instrument, the guitar that later became known as the Gibson J-200 was born into the Hollywood limelight in 1937 against a backdrop of Western films and country music. An icon of Gibson’s status and heritage for over 80 years, its flamboyant, larger-than-life design also made it the ultimate statement guitar for those icons of the silver screen whose hands it originally appeared in.

“The ‘singing cowboy’ movie star Ray Whitley is always credited as being the first to own [a J-200],” begins world renowned vintage guitar expert Walter Carter. “They sort of became a badge of recognition for country singers. Others, like Gene Autry, followed. Gene also had the first Martin D-45, which is another very fancy flat-top.”

Following Ray Whitley’s initial collaboration with Gibson, similar prototype guitars that followed were labelled as ‘L-5 Spec.’ and these were available as custom orders only. In 1938, the instrument entered production as the Super Jumbo and it was renamed Super Jumbo 200 the following year (hence the SJ-200 moniker) as an indication of its $200 retail value. In the late 1940s, the model name was shortened to J-200, although it was often still labelled as the SJ-200 well into the 1950s.

The earliest examples have a scale length of 26 inches and measure 16 7 /8 inches in width, while regular production Super Jumbo 200 models and onwards share the same 25¹/2-inch scale length and 17-inch body width as Gibson’s ‘Advanced’ L-5 archtops.