The First of the 'White Guards'
The Last of The Great Fifties Esquires


This amazing '54 Esquire weighs 7.80 lbs. and has a solid ash body. One-piece fretted maple neck with a thick profile very similar to a '52 Telecaster, 21 frets and black dot position markers. Single round string tree. Headstock decal with "Fender" spaghetti logo in silver with black trim and "Esquire" in black below it. Individual "no-name" Kluson Deluxe tuners with oval metal buttons. The tuning keys are stamped "23567766/PAT. APPLD." on the bottom base. The neck is dated in pencil "TG 10-54" [Tadeo Gomez, October 1954] and on the underside of the neck "Esq" is written in pencil. The neck cavity is also marked "10/54" in red pencil. Four-bolt neck plate with serial number ("8532") between the top two screws. White single-layer ABS (.060 inches thick) pickguard with five screws. Two controls (one volume, one tone) plus three-way "CRL 1452" "blender" switch and original Daka-Ware black plastic "Top-Hat" tip, all on metal plate adjoining pickguard. The potentiometers are stamped "304 437" (Stackpole September 1954) and the three capacitors between the switch and the volume control are stamped ".05 MFD 150 VDC". The 2.5k resistor is the original brown with two red and one green band. Shorter chrome knobs with more pronounced domes and knurled sides. One black six-polepiece "copper-coated metal plate bottom" pickup with flush pole-pieces (angled in bridge-plate) with a huge output of 6.26k. Esquire/Telecaster combined bridge/tailpiece with three, quarter inch steel, smooth saddles, the screws angled at 45 degrees. This amazing Esquire is in totally original (8.75) excellent plus condition. There is a small area of 'arm' wear on the bass side of the body top. There are areas of edge wear and a few small marks on the back of the body. The lacquer finish is almost completely worn away from the back of the neck and the original frets have been dressed and still have plenty of life in them. The grain of the ash body shows beautifully through the butterscotch finish and this guitar is one of the best sounding Esquires that we have ever seen. Complete with the original 'ashtray' bridge cover. Housed in it's original 1954 Fender Tweed center-pocket "Koylon" hardshell case with red plush lining (8.00).

This guitar is one of the last of the great early fifties Esquire's… it has only the minor cosmetic changes that were made around mid-to-late '54 which were the change of pickguard from "black" to "white" and the change of bridge saddles from 3/16" brass with flat bottoms to 1/4" steel angled at 45 degrees, and the move of the serial number from the bridge plate to the neck plate… BUT the color is still the original "Butterscotch" and the bridge pickup on this one is still the great, wonderful, marvelous, superb, fantastic "flat-pole" pickup that had been used since the Esquire's and the Telecasters inception… by late 1955 this was gone forever… replaced by a new modified re-designed "staggered-pole" bridge pickup that would change the Esquire and the Telecaster sound forever.

"Leo Fender's new solidbody was the instrument that we know now as the Fender Telecaster, effectively the world's first commercially successful solidbody electric guitar...The guitar was originally named the Fender Esquire and then the Fender Broadcaster, and it first went into production in 1950. It was a simple, effective instrument. It had a basic, single-cutaway, solid slab of ash for a body, with a screwed-on maple neck. Everything was geared to easy production. It had a slanted pickup mounted into a steel bridge-plate carrying three adjustable bridge-saddles, and the body was finished in a yellowish color known as blond. It was unadorned and like nothing else. It was ahead of its time (Tony Bacon, 50 Years of Fender, p. 10).

"Both the Telecaster and the Esquire kept their basic 1951 appointments until the mid-50s. In retrospect, their most striking features -- at least cosmetically speaking -- are a typical yellowed blonde finish (a.k.a. 'butterscotch' finish) and a black pickguard, hence the often cited notion of early 'black guard' Tellies. The combination of the two actually gives a distinct look to the early 50s models, which are otherwise considered by many as the ultimate classic Telecaster guitar because of their tone...Besides its peculiar hue, the original blonde finish nicely showcases the ash body heavy grain pattern that later whiter finishes would subdue...[1954] marks the beginning of a number of changes in the appointments of Telecaster [and Esquire] guitars. By Fall, the bakelite black guard was replaced by a single ply white trim and a few months later steel superseded brass for the bridge saddles. FENDER also changed the finishing process of the blonde finish...The typical 'butterscotch' colour gave way to a creamier shade which would soon evolve into a lighter off-white finish. Finally, 1954 is also the year when the serial number was removed from the bridge plate to be stamped on the neck anchor plate... Beyond these cosmetic features, a more dramatic evolution took place in 1955. The bridge pickup was modified to incorporate staggered pole pieces in place of the flush level-poles of the original design...Finally, the round clubby neck of the post-1950 guitars evolved into pronounced 'V' feel by 1955 and until early 1958 'boat necks' were the rule on most Fender instruments...At the end of 1956, Telecaster [and Esquire] guitars no longer looked or even sounded exactly the same as the 1951 models...In the course of 1958, necks gradually changed for a flatter cross section" (A.R. Duchossoir, The Fender Telecaster, p. 16).

"The earliest necks made in 1950 (e.g. Broadcaster) have a pronounced V-shape and their thickness is usually close to one inch. If one takes the 1st and 12th fret as a reference for the cross-section, .95" and 1.00" would be a good average indication for the period. By early 1951, necks became more rounded and less 'Veed' with slight variations in thickness, e.g. .90" and 1.00" on a '52 Telly, but overall kept a similar cross-section until the mid-50's." (A.R. Duchossoir, The Fender Telecaster, p. 53).