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The C. B. Gitty Gold Foil acoustic pickup is one of the most versatile and easiest magnetic pickups to mod for cigar box guitars.  They're deliciously cheap and I always have a half dozen of them in my woodshop at any time. It should be noted that these suckers have such a gloriously trashy 1960's vibe to them, just like Hound Dog Taylor's guitars. I recently used a Gold Foil in a cigar box guitar and I radically modded it to look like a rusty old Harmony/Teisco top-mount pi …

We’ve been buried in entries for the 2020 Banjo Build-Off! This week, we’re going to announce the first sets of winners.Anybody who entered through Cigar Box Nation dot com, Instagram or our Friends of C. B. Gitty group on Facebook had a chance for a random drawing. We’re announcing two winners from each social media channel today. Each of these winners receive a $50 C. B. Gitty Gift Certificate.  (Winners will be contacted Monday, Nov. 9, 2020 with your prizes)CIGAR BOX NATION Seth Tabbere …

Just as A. E. Staley's baking powder worked wondrous transformations in bakers' recipes a century ago, so a hearty measure of artistry transformed an old packing crate into this beautiful heirloom guitar.  Wooden crates were once the mainstay of product packaging in the United States, and box-making factories abounded - many manufacturers even had their own box-making plants. Often these boxes and crates would be printed with branding and product info, making them both beautifully deco …

So rock me mama like a wagon wheel, rock me mama any way you feel...  Before I had even finished my last heirloom build (the One-Way Ticket Steamer Trunk Guitar), I started thinking about what my next project would be. I can't remember exactly when it came to me, but at some point the idea popped into my mind: what about building a guitar from an old wooden wagon wheel? I could call it the Wagon Wheel Guitar and play one of my favorite songs, Wagon Wheel on it... it seemed like a gre …

A guitar whose roots go down into the bedrock bones of the earth... I grew up in Marblehead, Ohio, a rocky peninsula that juts out into Lake Erie. The center of that peninsula is one giant limestone quarry, where for nearly 200 years men have been blasting out the stone, cutting it into blocks for building and crushing down into gravel. On nearby Kelley's Island out in the lake, similar work was done. For many years dynamite was used to blast the stone free, and that dynamite came in beauti …