“I have all the history on this guitar. It’s an interesting story. Back in 1998, the original owner – a guy by the name of Verlin Whitford – sent me photos of it. On the back of a photo, he’d written ‘1951 Tele and original case’ along with his name and phone number. So I called him right away and said, ‘Hey, that’s a cool Telecaster. Can you tell me about it?’
“As it turned out, Verlin and Leo Fender had a close mutual
