The city the Germans once called Schönbach-Stadt is located Ústí nad Labem Region of the Czech Republic where the Czechs now call it Luby u Chebu. Located in the district of Eger (called Cheb by the Czechs), Schönbach was once a capital of violin makers. Violins were shipped out to places all over the globe from this city. One violinmaker in Schönbach was a man named Fred Wilfer, born in the Bohemian area in 1917. He rose up to become head of one of the violinmaker guilds in Schönbach.

In the aftermath of the Second World War, Wilfer caught wind of the Allies’ plans to redivide and redistrict Germany—Schönbach was going to be made part of Czechoslovakia. Wilfer decided to put his violinmakers on trains and brought them into Franconia—a German state bordering Eger. By moving his violinmakers further into Germany, Wilfer sought to them keep from becoming unwilling residents of neighboring Czechoslovakia which would be a huge blow to Germany’s thriving violin industry—absolutely essential to the war-torn nation’s shattered economy. Wilfer sought permission from the Bavarian government to resettle his violinmakers which was enthusiastically granted.

To accomplish his aims, Wilfer founded “Franconian music production Fred Wilfer investment trust” on January 1, 1946, which was later shortened to Framus. Wilfer’s luthiers were sent to the Bavarian city of Erlangen in March. Wilfer found housing for his workers as well as shops and, by August, a factory in Möhrendorf. Soon, Framus was making other instruments besides violins. Guitars were particularly in demand and Framus needed shops for guitar-building.

After two years of good sales, the factory was no longer adequate and a new one was opened in Baiersdorf in 1948. The following year, a new factory was set up in Bubenreuth. While the luthiers moved there in perparation for starting work in the new factory, which was being carefully designed and built, the factory was not opened until 1954 but was considered state-of-the-art. One hundred and seventy employees produced 2000 instruments a month at this facility.

By the late 50s, rocknroll was in huge demand and Framus wasn’t about to miss out on the phenomenon and began producing electric as well as acoustic guitars. Framus also began manufacturing electric basses. Oddly, there wasn’t a lot of demand for the instruments in Germany but rather British musicians bought Framus instruments in hopes of imitating American rocknroll and blues. With little hope of obtaining top quality American Fenders, Gibsons, Gretsches and Rickenbackers, European musicians scouted out the cheapest but most reliable European instruments. As a result, Framus has the distinction of being the first electric bass used professionally in Britain when Jet Harris of the The Shadows began using the Framus Star Bass. His successor, Brian Locking, also used the Framus Star Bass as did Bill Wyman.

http://www.ebertwelding.com/ogeriff/scrapb...Framus-2348.jpg
Framus Star Bass.

Soon, Framus built another factory in Pretzfeld not far from Bubenreuth. John Lennon starting playing a Framus Hootenany in 1965 and Paul McCartney played (and still plays) a Zenith which was built for him by Framus on commission from Boosey & Hawkes. By 1966, Framus was the top guitar manufacturer in Europe consisting of 300 employees. Both famous musicians and many of Germany’s top politicians were frequent visitors to Bubenreuth.


But Framus wasn’t the only success story to originate from the Schönbach violinmakers. A much earlier company had been founded there by violinmaker Karl Höfner in 1887 called Karl Höfner GmbH & Co. KG. In a short while, Höfner became the leading producer of stringed instruments in Germany. Karl’s sons, Josef and Walter, joined the company in 1920 and both were keen observers of musical trends. As with Framus, the Höfner company began to diversify into guitars and basses. These became so successful that Höfner split into two operations: one for guitars and other for “stringed instruments” meaning violins, viola and the like. Walter ran the guitar division having become seasoned in the business violin manufacture.

In 1953, two years after Fender introduced the first successful electric bass guitar, Gibson introduced “The Electric Bass.” At this time, there were no guarantees that a horizontally played bass would be anything other than a fad. Then again, it might be here to stay. Gibson’s Electric Bass hedged the bets. It was violin-shaped and came with a long end peg that could be inserted into the end of the body so that the bass could be played upright. If one preferred to play the bass like a guitar, the long end peg could be easily removed. Eventually this bass became known as the EB-1. By that time, the horizontal bass guitar was the mainstay and the vertical guitars became obsolete.

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Above and below, Gibson’s EB-1 from 1953.

The EB-1’s appeal was to look as much like a double bass as possible. Its f-hole and purfling were painted on—purely decorative touches since the EB-1 was a solidbody guitar. The one shone above even has a tugbar mounted on the pickguard which is also found on the Emperador violin bass from Japan. Like the Audiovox Model 736, the EB-1 was 30.5” scale but appears to have arrived at that length independently of Paul Tutmarc almost two decades before. But instead of Model 736’s sixteen frets, the EB-1 had 20.

The EB-1 was only nominally popular and was discontinued in only a few years. Around 1970, Gibson reissued the EB-1, this time without the long end peg. The move may have been prompted by the desire to cut into Höfner’s violin bass market which was still going strong. I played one and found them quite adequate with good tone, lightweight, good action and excellent physical balance. But alas the reissue saw only nominal success, apparently everyone wanted Höfners and Gibson discontinued the EB-1 apparently for good.

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Also in 1955, Höfner of Germany turned out a line of cheap basses. This bass, the 500/1 was based on the EB-1 violin-shaped design (Walter Höfner had once made violins and perhaps that’s why it appealed to him). Höfner lifted both the violin-shape design and the 30.5” scale length. He added a tailpiece however, which made the 500/1 implosive. The sides and back were of maple, the top was spruce, the neck was maple and contained 22 frets. The feather-light body was hollow unlike the EB-1 but lacked f-holes—painted or otherwise—and produced a very woody, satisfying tone when amplified. Far cheaper than a P-bass, the 500/1 became a favorite among British working class bands.

http://en.woodbrass.com/images/woodbrass/HOFNER+HCT500+1.JPG

And I don't have to tell you what happened next.