Gibson L7

by Bill Carnes
(Grass Valley CA)

I have a Gibson L7 sn/00488
On the head piece it say The Gibson. I have not been able to find any other pictures of L7's that say The Gibson. All I can find are L7's from 1933 which only say Gibson.
The body meets the neck at the 14th fret and it has a 16" body with a sun burst finish. It has ivory inlays starting at the 3rd fret.
Do you know about what it would be worth and what year it was made.
My father, who passed away, swore he bought it in 1931.
The tuning machines have been replaced as well as the tail piece.

Hi, Bill--

This is very confusing. The guitar looks from the neck to the body to be a Gibson L 4. The L4 was manufactured from 1902-1933. 1929 was the year that the logo changed from "The Gibson" to "Gibson"--no Gibson guitars said "The Gibson" after that as far as I can tell.

The problem is that the L4 has a round sound hole and your guitar has F holes (although I can't see them in the picture). The L7 has inlays all the way on the neck while the F4 inlays begin at the 3rd fret.

The L7 was definitely not manufactured until 1933. The serial number that you provided came up as "unrecognized" and after much searching I could still find no definite info.

The Blue Book Values for the L7 are:

1933-1934

Excellent $3,100 - 3,600
Average $2,000 - 2,350

So I guess my answer is a resounding "I Don't Know!" You might want to check out Vintage Guitar Info: Gibson. There is a lot of valuable info about vintage Gibson guitars on that page.

Best Wishes!
Lynne