BIG SKY
BUILDER
LEFT: The Pirates of the Caribbean J- 200, worth an estimated $100,000
RIGHT: Some of the dtail work on the Pirates guitar
less than he would spend on legal fees.”
At that moment, the light blub went off in
Jay’s head; he immediately found Henry
and began discussing the prospect of buying Flatiron. According to Ferguson, Jay
told Henry, “These guys are making great
mandolins; don’t put them out of business.”
Jay then persuaded Henry to sit down with
Carlson and make peace – this eventually
led to the purchase of the Flatiron Mandolin
Company by Gibson. These days, Stanley
likes to say that he was instrumental in facilitating the meeting between the two, pun
intended. Soon after the deal, Steve Carlson
sent Jay a Master Model F- 5 mandolin as a
thank you.
Shortly after the acquisition of Flatiron, it was
decided to move the acoustic production off
the floor of the Nashville plant to facilitate
Les Paul production. The machinery that was
left from flattop production was shipped
on semi trucks to the plant at Bozeman.
There were only a few usable machines from
Gibson Nashville; needing more resources,
Carlson bought two flatbed trailers full of
tennis racket making machines in Colorado
for the paltry sum of $3200. “We basically
melted down the aluminum and made a
side bending machine from the tennis racket
machines,” Ren says. Over time, Carlson was
put in charge of building a new facility and
Ren took over making fixtures and jigs to
facilitate guitar making.
THE MINDSET
Early in Ren’s building career, he possessed
a romantic idea about the guitars he and
the Bozeman plant make. He believed there
were “unwritten songs” inside each and
every guitar, whether it ended up with a
teenage girl playing only for her cat, or in the
hands of Emmylou Harris, playing in front of
thousands nightly.
New ownership meant new changes. One of
the most difficult mindsets for Ren to adopt
came from a meeting with Henry. Henry told
Ren, “Don’t over-romanticize the making of
these guitars – they are just boxes, for crying
out loud.” Ren took Henry’s words to heart
and over a period of time finally understood
that even if they were making apple crates,
they needed to make the best, most durable
apple crates they could. They also had to be
made with the least amount of materials, in
the quickest way possible and in a way that
makes a profit for the company. Ren admits
that this was eventually an epiphany for him.
“Henry wants us to make the best sounding
guitars that never come back,” he says. “We
are all just sharecroppers of the Gibson tradition. We get to get up in the morning and
come make the best guitars in the world.”
And it seems that every employee in the
Montana plant feels that same duty; when
visitors tour the Bozeman plant they are
frequently impressed at how “heads down”
the entire staff is. They are focused on making guitars; their collective attention to detail
and dedication might be compared to a
colony of bees. “No one is lounging about
here,” Ren says.
That dedication and singular focus has paid
off. There are numerous buyers around
the globe who are waiting in the wings for
Ren Ferguson’s next “Master Museum”
guitar, and they are willing to pay upwards
of $50,000 just to own one. “They don’t
sound any better than the standard J-200s,”
Ren surmises, “but they sure don’t sound
any worse.” When asked about how he felt
