Samuel C.  Osborn  Mfg.  Co.
SammO

I know this is 1920ish because Sam Osborn went bankrupt in 1923 having stopped production in 1922. When they were in business though they were supposed to be pretty good. It's a cheeky invite because this was another "Buy it now or best offer" and the offer I put in was very low compared to what the "buy it now" price was and I didn't really expect them to accept. I was expecting a counter offer and see about serious negotiations from that. Also on eBay they didn't put up a good picture of the whole thing from the front so it would be a bit of a stab in the dark from me and I was fully prepared to walk away in the counter offer was too high. There was a lot of other pictures though and from them it all look genuine and in very good condition for it's age, (also the written description said there was no issues - though I know better than to believe them! if nothing else they said it was made in the 1930's or 40's so they were not reliable on that). I hope it will be as good as the pictures suggest and once it it here I can take some nice pictures of it then and may be learn "Buddy can you spare a dime?" or even "sweet home Chicago".

It's here now so I've taken a photo's of it for this page, (I'll leave it to the reader to say if they are any good or not though?) It is pretty much as described, there is some separation on the back seam, and possibly a small crack in the back which may or may not have been repaired?. I would also say the bridge has come off at some point but it has been firmly reattached now, (and the suspect crack is kind of behind it so it may well have been sorted at the same time?), so I shan't worry any more about that. On the who though for a 100+ year old Ukulele it is in remarkably good condition! If the tuners aren't original they weren't put on very long after it was made and I am inclined to think they are original; they also work very well too (though the strings it came with are pretty crappy), what particularly impresses me about the condition though is the sound hole label. It has very little of the raggedness you usually see on labels of this age and does lend itself to you thinking the Ukulele is not as old as it is. There is no doubt it's genuine though, why would anyone fake a SammO? If they were going to go to all that effort they would fake a Martin or a Gibson; or at least the more deluxe Samuel Osborne SammoS range? And it would cost a lot more than I paid for it to make a fake this good:- and it is good; and when I get the back fixed firmly it will be good for another 100 years.