The Elusive "Dwight Silver Fox"
as Used by Steve Marriott

This near mint but elusive "Silver Fox" weighs just 5.60 lbs. Contoured solid mahogany body, one-piece mahogany neck with a nice medium-to-thick profile and rosewood fretboard with 22 original jumbo frets and inlaid pearl dot position markers. Scalloped "batwing" headstock with six-on-a-side closed-back Kluson Deluxe strip tuners with white plastic oval buttons. Gold silk-screened Epiphone headstock logo. Serial number "570326" stamped in yellow on back of headstock. Single-layer black plastic bullet-shaped truss-rod cover with two screws and "Dwight/Model" engraved in white. Single P-90 pickup (in the bridge position) with an output of 6.14k. Three-layer (white/black/white) plastic pickguard with the stylized Epiphone "E" embossed in silver. Two controls (one volume, one tone) with black plastic, ribbed-side knobs with metal tops. Pre-set ridged bridge and factory Epiphone Maestro Vibrola tailpiece. This super light guitar is in near-mint (9.25) condition with just a few very small surface marks on the back and sides of the body. The potentiometers are both dated "137 66 07" (CTS, February 1966). Housed in the original Epiphone gray shaped, three-latch softshell case with blue felt lining (8.75).

The 'Dwight' guitars were built by the Epiphone Company in Kalamazoo, Michigan and were distributed by the Chicago Musical Instrument Company. When CMI closed shop, they sold the Dwights to the Sonny Shields Music Company in East St. Louis, Illinois. The brand was then owned by Charles “Dwight” Shields. Back in the 1950’s to the 1960’s, the Sonny Shields Music Company was a big music shop. The shop had several Dwight guitars that were built by Supro. The most well known was the Epiphone Coronet that was available in the market between 1963 and 1968. It has the name “Dwight” on the headstock and sometimes the letter “D” on the scratch plate, similar to the “E” in the original Epiphones. The guitars were then distributed by the Chicago Musical Instrument Company. When CMI closed shop, they sold the Dwights to the Sonny Shields Music Company by the dozen. It would not be surprising if there were still many Dwights hidden away in many warehouses of the Sonny Shields Music Company.

"[In 1957] Gibson purchased Epiphone and relocated it to Kalamazoo, Michigan, turning the brand into its second-tier line. In 1958 Gibson started to manufacture and market its new Epiphone lines. These included the first Epiphone solidbody electric guitars, similar in style to Les Paul Specials and Juniors; the equal-double-cutaway, slab-bodied, two-pickup Crestwood; and the low-end one-pickup Coronet. Both models were fitted with small pickups now known as 'New York' types because they were devised and originally used when the company occupied its east-coast premises...[In] 1959, the Epi solidbody line was expanding. The Crestwood was renamed the Crestwood Custom, restyled with a trimmer, more rounded body that sported New York pickups until a change was made to mini-humbuckers in 1963. The Coronet remained, but now came with a P-90 single-coil pickup...In 1963 the Epi solidbodies were redesigned to feature a longer upper horn as well as a scalloped 'batwing' six-tuners-in-line headstock" (Tony Bacon, Electric Guitars: The Illustrated Encyclopedia, pp. 54-55).

Silver Fox, the rarest of all the Epiphone colors, is a translucent green filled with a whitish silver filler to show the grain. It first became available as an option on Coronets in 1963. In the July 1, 1963 Epiphone Price List, the SB 533MV Coronet ("double cutaway, Silver Fox or Cherry finish, single pickup, Maestro Vibrola") is listed at $181.00 and the SB 533 Coronet ("double cutaway, Silver Fox or Cherry finish, single pickup") at $154.00. In the June 22, 1965 Price List, the SB 533 Coronet ("double cutaway, Silver Fox or Cherry finish, single pickup, Vibrola") is listed at $175.00. And in the June 1, 1968 Price List, the SB 533 Coronet is listed at $205.00, in Cherry finish only. See Walter Carter, Epiphone: The Complete History, pp. 120-122.