Gibson Banner Southern Jumbo and the famous Skunk Stripe.

Folkway Music's Mark Stutman discusses some of the construction attributes of Gibson's 'Banner' flattops (those made during WWII), with specific reference to the "Skunk Stripe" detail along the centerline of the top, as well as the extra-large neck profile these guitars are famous for.

[@woodbox50]

What he said Mark, Thank you for great information and history.

[@246810user]

Mark, another great video! It was very interesting and informative. And what a great way to document an old guitar. Thanks

[@BagnascoCasatiGuitars]

I like the idea of sending problem top center seams to south where humidity is higher. Makes a lot of sense

[@1allstarman]

yeah until the owner decides to take a vacation or move up north .

[@bldallas]

That skunk stripe on the top is really attractive! I don’t think I’ve ever seen one before. Really cool design idea.

[@superfuzzymomma]

Magnificent sounding instrument

[@robzagar4275]

Excellent show! Thank you

[@firecrackerheart]

fascinating as always, mark .. .

[@williamvanvugt9117]

I think your hypothesis is spot-on.(I'm a 1943 J45 owner from Michigan)

[@steelhead197]

Wonderful video…very informative! Thanks! 🇨🇦👍🏻

[@joemcgraw5529]

wow just found your channel and must say very very impressed with your knowlege and craftmanship !!!

[@TheFolkwayMusic]

Thanks! Glad you found us!

[@wolfgangwilleke3429]

Its a jolly good explanation...very good!

[@kenhughes4715]

Fantastic, thank you

[@brownmonkeybananayellow]

Love these vids! I learned a lot as always. I am putting together a LP JR and asked the painter to add a stringer not to hide anything I just like it. Hmm a skunk stripe on an electric might be cool as well.

[@michaelcuneo3834]

What a beauty...dang!!

[@Richard_Lush]

I always thought that the larger necks were in compensation for a lack of truss rod. I thought maybe they were being proactive knowing that the truss rods would eventually be eliminated due to metal consumption by the war effort. Yeah the skunk stripe makes sense. I know a lot of guitars during the banner period had truss rods but I know they stopped using them.

[@dannymarks988]

Cool Theory Great Info

[@johngeddes7894]

In the ‘60s, natural finished guitars by Gibson were more expensive that their sunburst counterparts. I can’t swear that the 1950s were similar, but I suspect it was.. the sunburst tops had some flaws that Gibson felt needed hiding.

[@britlitemail]

That seems like a really reasonable explanation. It would be neat (although almost certainly unreasonable?) for repairpeople who deal with this era of Gibsons to record interesting features like this and throw them into some Excel sheet, like a guitar nerd analogue to some public scientific data repositories that exist. Could really serve to corroborate some ideas like the one you suggested. In any case, thanks for the video! Always good to learn more about Gibson idiosyncrasies.

[@TheFolkwayMusic]

Agreed. Joe Glaser attempted to get this idea out there a few years ago, but there was, unfortunately, a lot of pushback from owners and repair people who were worried about possible negative repercussions of their guitar's repair histories being on the public record. It's important to document this stuff. Just as important to share your notes, IMHO.

[@superfuzzymomma]

My 49 SJ also has a huge round neck shape which I love as a player.Wonder about how much neck shape on these acoustics changed into the late 40s after war, and for what reasons if any. Your video is excellent friend!

[@wadebolderman3250]

Hey Mark, great job you performed on this old 43 SJ Banner Skunk! I currently own two older Gibson acoustics, a 1934 Century in great playing condition and a 1944 Banner LG2 with laminate maple back and sides. Basically rebuilt a few years back and a great sounding box. I remember back in the mid 1990s, when Gary Burnette told me a guitar show that the former head of Gibson, Julius Belson said the Skunk striped SJs were a way of using, as you said, lesser quality wood for the tops because parts were hard to get during the war years. Because Gibson's records were lost in a fire shortly after the WW2, there's no way to know really. But you're right, they are highly sought after and can be the cannons they were meant to be. My Banner LG2 is even a cannon, despite the use of laminate. Those war years were very sketchy for Gibson, to say the least. We love them so much today because of several reasons, one being that for years and prior to John Thomas' book coming out, Gibson claimed they didn't make hardly any guitars during those war years and today we know there were around 25,000 guitars built and shipped in those years. We may never know if they were planning to ship these Skunks only to the South or not, but it's fun to wonder and talk about it. Well done! Perry

[@walterw2]

so cool "skunk stripe" is what they call the walnut filler strip on the back of a one piece maple _fender_ neck, i wonder if that term migrated over to the much rarer gibson acoustic top stripe

[@earlcarr3451]

Great video! Love these banner Gibsons! Does the skunk stripe correspond to when you see a lot of mahogany topped J-45s? Perhaps there was a brief time when Gibson had a short supply of a spruce. So they reserved the spruce jumbo tops for the SJs even if they were sub par, and would use mahogany for the J-45s 🤷‍♂️ I like the theory that they placed them on SJs and shipped them south too. Some mystery is what makes these Gibson flattops so great!

[@TheFolkwayMusic]

Interesting theory, too. Let’s add that one to the pile!

[@001USA001]

The stripe looks nicer with the split parallelograms than with dots in my opinion. Happy coincidence probably.

[@MylesDavis]

Stingers, not stringers! Great video.

[@TheFolkwayMusic]

Thanks 👍 Oops!

[@torontolarrivee7965]

Sounds like more thought than Gibson would ever put into such matters.

[@henrymiller64]

Not being any sort of expert here I look at this from an analytical perspective. Since there were no flaws on the top of the guitar in this instance I think we can discount the visual 'distraction' theory, which is sort of weak to begin with, particularly as you say the black band constitutes added material. Next, while it seems that these guitars may have developed flawed seams in the curing process, one can't rule out- in fact, according to Occam's razor, isn't it more likely- that the tops were slightly too narrow to begin with (perhaps due to the shrinking of not fully seasoned wood after the top blanks were cut?). In normal times any narrow tops might have been culled, however given the shortage of materials due to the war effort, perhaps it was decided to use the narrow tops and install a joining strip. Or perhaps, alternately, Gibson was forced to repurpose some tops pre-cut for smaller guitars? Regarding these conjectures, I recently read that a famous luxury wooden sailboat manufacturer in MA (Concordia) had defied an order from the Office of War Mobilization to surrender it's seasoned wood stocks to the government for the war effort. Perhaps Gibson had also been subject to such directives greatly reducing it's stocks of seasoned wood and causing it to use poorly seasoned wood that shrank?

[@TheFolkwayMusic]

The black strip is not a fillet of added material. It is a painted line that conceals a poor top joint, many of which have a narrow (ie .010" to .02" wide) splice. It has nothing to do with wood shrinkage, but rather, poor workmanship. Hope that clears up the confusion.

[@fleadoggreen9062]

you must’ve really really liked guitars and music to learn how to play like that , upside down I mean! Pretty cool

[@TheFolkwayMusic]

Something like that! Thanks!

[@kingcormack8004]

I hate to suggest a correction to someone so erudite but isn't the word "stinger" not "stringer"? Love your videos!

[@TheFolkwayMusic]

It is, and you're right! If there was a way to change it now we would. Much appreciated.

[@rstevenhanson]

You know your shit!

[@dougdillman6643]

they were large because of lack of material for truss rods

[@TheFolkwayMusic]

That is a good part of the reason. It is thought that they were also larger than normal because of the changes in workforce, and the wartime employees' inexperience in neck carving. Banner necks with truss rods are quite a bit larger than 'normal' as well.

[@bradc32]

load em up move em out rawhide....nice banner

[@Iazzaboyce]

Back then the centre seam would've been planed by hand and if the guys with that skill had gone off to war, it's possible the seams on a pile of tops were not very tight - looks like a cover-up to me.

[@TheFolkwayMusic]

Exactly.

[@WysteriaGuitar]

Rule #1, never buy a Gibby with a skunk stripe...

[@steelhead197]

Yep….thats what I would take away from this combined with what I already know about war time production 👍🏻🇨🇦

[@HarryNicNicholas]

nice one, i do like a good conspiracy theory, although girls making guitars with big necks? i'd like to know what went on in gibsons factory cos i've said elsewhere i have a 66 j45 and had in the past a 66 LG1 and two 66 LG0's and they all have entirely different necks. either gibson's tooling was a bit hit amd miss or every guitar is literally hand made.