National Style 2.5 Tricone Squareneck Resophonic Guitar, Nickel, 1930

The National Style 2.5 Tricone Squareneck, or ‘Style Two and a Half’ is very close to the Style 2, with just a rose engraving on coverplate’s hand rest making the difference.

At the time of production, Hawaiian music was enjoying great popularity throughout North America, and square neck models like this were offered as well as round-neck versions. The rose engraving visible on the hand rest identifies it as a Style 2.5 or 2 1/2. Its serial number places its production around mid to late October 1930.

This National Style 2.5 Tricone Squareneck is in good, largely original condition, and is completely playable. The nickel plating is very clean, with no real oxidization, corrosion or denting. It plays well, and sounds great – it is unmistakable when played. These are built to fill a room and successfully compete with banjos.

This is a wonderful piece, with a warm, very full sound and is sold with its original hard shell case.

Introduced in 1927, the Style 2 was the top of the National line, with a brass body with nickel plating. The wooden components, such as the headstock, are Mahogany, except for the Ebony fingerboard.
National Resophonic guitars were a radical, major innovation in musical instrument design aimed directly at new challenges facing musicians.

As audiences and venues grew in size, it was necessary to increase instrument volumes. At the time, another instrument on the bandstand was the banjo, not a quiet competitor. As the Marshall Stack was inconceivable at the time, innovators like George Beauchamp sought out builders like John Dopyera to solve the volume problem using spun aluminum cones. The resulting designs were successful, and the National Musical Instrument Company was formed in Los Angeles; some metal parts were made in Adolph Rickenbacher’s nearby machine shop. Over time, this arrangement fractured and the DoBro (Dopyera Brothers) company split off, and Rickenbacher started producing other instruments including the classic ‘Frying Pan’ electric lap steel guitars, and from 1931 to 1937 the Ken Roberts model, possibly the first production electric guitar.

The modern National Reso-Phonic Guitar company of San Luis Obispo, California offers modern versions of the National String Instrument Corporation designs.