Fender American Vintage II 1951 Telecaster Electric Guitar, Maple, Butterscotch Blonde

Fender’s American Vintage II Series is a meticulously designed collection of period-correct electric guitars and basses. Each model is carefully chosen and recreated based on its contribution to the Fender story of that year. All models feature year specific bodies, necks, hardware, finishes, and pickups. American Vintage II is the most accurate production series of legacy instruments across the timeline of Fender history.

The fall of 1951 was the first true introduction of the Telecaster. Prior versions had other names, or no name, because of infringement issues with the Gretsch company over the name “Broadcaster”. Leo decided to capitalize on success of the television culture and thus we have the first blackguard Telecaster off the line. Since then, the single cutaway, solid-body Tele has been in the fender line-up in one incarnation or another, without fail.

The American Vintage II 1951 Telecaster sports the iconic Butterscotch Blonde nitrocellulose lacquer finish over a solid ash body. The neck profile at this point was the beefy ’51 “U” shaped profile. Some might say its too big but others find that the larger necks give the hand a place to rest while the fingers do the work across the 7.25” radius maple fingerboard. The AVII ’51 Tele is a string-through-body design with 3 brass saddles, stretching across a 25.5” scale, over 2 Pure Vintage single coil pickups. This is the unmistakable Tele twang recipe, with single volume and single tone controls. Switching on this model is standard 3-way design with bridge/both/neck from 1-3. 1951 was the first year that the heel truss rod nut got a Phillips head adjustment, meanwhile the rest of the screws were all still flathead design.

This guitar comes complete with a vintage style tweed hardshell case with crushed red interior.