Extremely Rare Polaris White SG Special.

1963 Gibson SG Special.

This 13-inch-wide SG Special weighs just 6.20 lbs. and has a solid mahogany body. One-piece mahogany neck with a nice, fat nut width of over 1 11/16 inches and a standard Gibson scale length of 24 3/4 inches. Rosewood fretboard with 22 original jumbo frets and inlaid pearl dot markers. Inlaid pearl "Gibson" headstock logo and 'bell'shaped black over white plastic truss-rod cover with two screws. Closed-back Kluson Deluxe strip tuners with white plastic oval buttons. Serial number "119878" stamped in blind on back of headstock. Two really hot P-90 pickups with balanced outputs of 8.27k and 8.25k. Five-layer black over white plastic pickguard with five screws. Four controls (two volume, two tone) plus three-way pickup selector switch. Black plastic bell-shaped knobs with metal tops. The potentiometers are stamped "137 6336" (CTS, September 1963). Wrap-over pre-compensated, intonation adjustable, bridge/stud tailpiece. Nickel-plated hardware. This wonderful fifty year old SG Special is in exceptionally fine (9.00) condition with just some minor finish checking and a few very small and insignificant surface chips on the body edges. Housed in the original Gibson three-latch aligator soft-shell case with brown felt lining (8.75).

The Les Paul Special was introduced as the TV Special in 1955 as an intermediate model between the regular Les Paul guitar and the lower-priced Junior and TV Junior instruments. The Special underwent two successive body redesigns in 1958 and 1961, while the Les Paul affiliation was discontinued in late 1962. The model was then renamed the SG Special without any apparent changes in the specifications other than the removal of Les Paul markings.

In 1963, Gibson shipped 374 SG Specials in Polaris White as compared to 1,017 in Cherry. However, in total, between 1962 and 1968, they shipped only 1,956 in Polaris White as compared to 16,090 in Cherry.