Fender Jaguar History
by Nick Katzban-Beren

Jazzmaster
The Jaguar’s story begins way back in the late 50’s, with the invention of a guitar known as the “Jazzmaster”. Forrest White, one of the three main Fender men, back then, had been experimenting with double circuit guitars. He had worked on a guitar with the ability to set two totally different tones and change between them with the flick of a switch. Forrest submitted the idea to his friend and co-worker Leo Fender. “Leo didn’t play guitar, he couldn’t even tune a guitar, so he didn’t think this was important.” Said Forrest later. Luckily for all of us, a musician named Alvino Rey came into the plant and Forrest pitched the Idea to him. Alvino loved it and Leo was sold.
So the new guitar that was created came with two separate circuits. The Rhythm was controlled by two rollers on the upper wing, which set the tone and volume. On the lower wing, for the lead circuit, a toggle switch controlled the sound and the two knobs marked tone and Volume controlled just that. The guitar also introduced a locking system so as to save tunings in case of a string break, a separate bridge and tail piece, and an “offset waist” body which was design to be more comfortable when played sitting down. The Guitar was Fender’s top of the line guitar. Sadly enough the guitar just didn’t do well. Part of its problem’s stemmed from its huge single-coil pickups, which attracted static currents and caused too much of a squeal.

Pre-CBS Jaguar
What it all comes down to is the fact that it was just too much. One fact of the guitar industry is that simplicity is the key (i.e. Electro-Harmonix pedals, Les Paul Jr. and Telecasters, being simple ideas that went on to become legends.) so a guitar as complicated and ambitious as the Jaguar just didn’t fly. As the years went on and Fender went through its dark period with CBS (see my article “Post ‘65: Garbage or Jive?”), the Jaguar became the guitar that time forgot. It became an unwanted treasure. Vintage Jaguars could be found for $200 easy, it seemed as if no body cared anymore.

American Vintage Jaguar
To answer this new demand for Jaguars and Jazzmasters Fender ran a line of cheap Japanese made Jaguar and Jazzmaster reissues. The reissues of course were far from an exact copy from the originals. The Tuners wouldn’t stay in tune, the wood was cheap, and the finishes wore off easily. Still the reissues were popular until the late 90’s when they were discontinued. However, it wasn’t over for the Jaguar. And in 1999 Fender released an exact copy of its original vintage Jaguar as a part of ts American Vintage series.
The Jaguar was a beautiful guitar with an adventurous story. After being deemed “one of the finest solid body electric guitars that had ever been offered to the public”, to becoming yesterdays news, only to resurrect in one of the guitar industries greatest comebacks, the Jaguar has finally found its place in history as a legend.
Authored by: Nick Katzban-Beren