1960's Kay Vanguard K102 Guitar

This is probabaly a late 1960's Kay model based on the information I've found. It is a Vanguard model K102 with two DeArmond pickups (sometimes called the Vanguard 2) and they also came as the K100 with a single DeArmond pickup. Kay also produced these guitars for the Western Auto chain and badged them with the Truetone name and for Spiegel Catalog and badged them with the Old Kraftsman name.

Kay became the second-largest producer of inexpensive guitars and related instruments in Chicago behind Harmony. Both Harmony and Kay mass-produced many thousands of instruments under catalog brand names such as Silvertone (Sears), Airline (Montgomery Ward) and many others. The original Kay Musical Instrument Company in Chicago went out of business in 1968, but the name is still active, licensed to a line of cheap instruments from Asia.

You can find a lot of information on Kay guitars at the
King Of Kays

1960's Teisco Gold Foil Guitar Pickups

I acquired up these pickups in September of 2008 and they have market value of $100.00. They are 1960's vintage Goldfoil guitar pickups similar to those used by Ry Cooder on his guitar. This was Teisco's version of the famous DeArmond Gold Foil pickups used on many Harmony guitars of the 1960's.

These were pulled as a working matched set from a Melody branded Teisco guitar with other issues. I marked the N and B on the backs to track their original position on the guitar. The neck pickup measured 5.49K ohms and bridge pickup measured 5.43K ohms. The lead wires are over 8 inches long on both of the pickups.






The most popular way of using these pickups is the "CooderCaster", a custom guitar originally built for Ry Cooder. A lapsteel bridge pickup and the old Teisco Del Ray neck pickup is mounted to a Fender Stratocaster.

Here are some examples of guitars modified with the addition of a Teisco Goldfoil.






I have about 3 more sets of these pickups so if you're looking for a set, send me an email.