![]() ![]() That very SAME woodcut and copy appears in the first Sears catalog! There’s a guitar offered in Ward’s 1894 catalog with a woodcut and some copy. Sometime between Ward’s founding and Sears’ first catalog in 1894 Ward’s began selling guitars. Ward’s concept was so successful that Richard Sears and Alvah Roebuck decided to compete head-to-head with them, starting Sears, Roebuck & Co. Ward’s idea was to return to Chicago and put the lists together for them by assembling a catalog and sending it to the farmers direct. ![]() A representative would take it to the big city to buy the stuff and ship it back in one big container. To combat the high prices, the farmers joined to form buying clubs and put together lists. And their only source of merchandise was the railroads, who charged an arm and a leg. At the time, the farmer’s only source for household goods was the general store. Aaron Montgomery Ward started his company in 1872 as a solution to the problem of farmers obtaining the items they needed to make life more palatable out on the Great Plains. Ward’s was probably the first to sell guitars through its catalogs. Vintage 1965 Silvertone Teisco 1437 Electric Guitar
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