A retired couple here in our little town decided to open a second-hand shop and sell a lot of stuff they had acquired over the years. My wife being a very curious creature wanted to see what was in there and as it turned out it wasn’t all dresses and blouses as I had feared but some really interesting man stuff as well and leaning against the wall atop of one of the counters was a dreadnought sized guitar. It had been played very little and then put away to collect dust. It was a ’76 (Martin Lawsuit) Takamine with a couple dings in the top and when I tried to tune it up, I saw the bridge had lifted and was soon going to pop off so I back off the strings while the owner was telling me the story about trying to be a rock star and giving up early on. It was pretty grungy with lots of dust in side and out but we settled on a fair price and it had a new home with lots of company. I started on it right away popping the bridge off, cleaning and polishing it up, gluing the bridge with animal hide glue and installing a bone saddle in the bridge. For those who don’t know about guitars a Takamine guitar is made at the foot of the Takamine Mountain in Japan. Starting in 1962 it is one of the oldest manufacturers there and a cheaper way to go for your first guitar and thousands of them were sold here in the states. Now from a distance they looked exactly like a more expensive Martin the oldest and most sought after instruments of its kind in this country. It looked like they took a Martin apart and copied it inside and out right down to the gold lettering on the head stock. Sometime in the 70’s Martin filed a lawsuit against them and won, so they had to change their design. But many people who play still swear by them and they are still in demand. I tuned it up and just as i thought it had a very good tone.So now I have this old Tak with very few miles on it so if you or someone you know needs an old cheap guitar that looks like a Martin well drop me a line and we’ll talk…… linman@kc.rr.com ……Larry