Mike Longworth's Biography

(1938-2003)


mike


Mike was the historian of the C.F. Martin Inc. guitar company. He was also one of the most gifted inlay artists of his day. After Mike's tour of duty in the Air Force as an electronic specialist was complete, he reopened his guitar shop in Chattanooga, Tennessee and began repairing all sorts of fretted instruments. His specialty soon became converting Martin D-28 guitars to D-45's. Due to Mike's innate ability as an inlay artist, Martin was sending most of their D-45 guitars to him to add those special inlays. Due to the folk music boom of the 1960's, the demand for the D-45 guitars increased tremendously. Soon their work load was so great Mike could no longer produce these guitars in Chattanooga by himself. So Martin created a new department to produce the D-45, and hired Mike to come to Nazareth, Pennsylvania to train a whole new team of inlay artists.

One of the more notable instruments Mike did while he was still in Chattanooga was Hank Snow's guitar. Martin sent the guitar to Mike to perform his special artistry. Mike added the D-45 trim and the inlay bearing Hank's name in the fingerboard. According to Sue Longworth, this fingerboard was inlaid on the Longworth kitchen table. This fingerboard was later replaced by Mike while at Martin. He kept the original fingerboard as payment for the replacement fingerboard. At Mike's request, Sue gave the original fingerboard to Paul and David Hopkins after Mike's death.

The LouZee fingerboard was the last inlay pattern designed by Mike Longworth.

Mike's Thoughts on LouZee Banjos


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