Photo by John Peden, courtesy of the Country Music Hall of Fame.

Les Paul Log
Les Paul
Around 1940

During the 1930s, inventive individuals experimented with guitar bodies made from a solid piece of wood rather than soundboards over a hollow chamber—partly for ease of fabrication, partly to prevent feedback.

One of the most prominent innovators was Les Paul. He made this guitar by taking a 4x4-inch solid block of pine, fitting it with two homemade electronic pickups, and then gluing on the halves of a hollow-body guitar to make it look slightly more conventional.

Around 1946, Paul took his "log" idea to Gibson. Although the company did not use his design as a prototype, it did work with him and use his name to promote its first line of solid-body guitars in the 1950s.