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Clarence Leonidas Fender is born. Anaheim, California.
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Leo had graduated high school and was running an amateur radio station while building amplifiers and public address systems.
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Leo opens his first shop named Fender’s Repair Service,offering home made PA systems and musical instruments. -
Leo renamed his business to the Fender Electric Instruments Company. He turned his radio shop over to Dale Hyatt so he could concentrate on building instruments.
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During the spring of this year, the Fender Electric Instruments Company introduced a single and dual pickup solid body electric guitar. It was named the Esquire, about 50 were made, and were not fitted with a truss rod. Orders were being placed, though before production started, the instrument had been modified with an adjustable neck and renamed the Broadcaster. It was renamed again a year later to the Telecaster. The Telecaster sold for $189.50! -
Leo closed his repair shop to focus entirely on building solid body instruments, which by late 1951 included the first electric bass. The Precision bass is one of the most popular bass designs to this day. Leo needed an amp to run it through though, so he built the Bassman amp. -
This was the year the Stratocaster was introduced. The most popular guitar ever made and copied. It made the Fender company worth millions and made Leo an icon in the music world. -
From it’s release in 1954, the strat had many changes made from year to year, including varying amounts of contouring on the body, materials used for the control knobs, pickguard, headstock shape, serial number placement, etc. -
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Kurt Cobain from the famous and everlasting band Nirvana, used a 1969 Fender Mustang to record multiple songs and even play live. -
Fender begin production of their acoustic guitars. Fender at this point now had over 600 employees, 500 of them in manufacturing. -
At age 55, Leo suffered health problems and offered to sell Fender Electric Instruments to his parter in Fender Sales, Donald Randall,for $1.5 million. Randoll not having the resources to purchase the company himself, agreed to find another buyer.
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On January 5th 1965, Fender was sold to a subsidiary of CBS (Columbia Broadcasting Systems) called Columbia Records Distribution Corp. for $13 million. CBS began making changes almost immediately. -
Forest White was demoted from vice-president to plantmanager after the takeover. He quit less than two years later over a dispute regarding the quality of an amplifier CBS planned on producing.
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Donald Randall, now vice-president and general manager under CBS also left the company. His departure was due to corporate politics and concerns over quality. Many other long term employees felt quality was taking a back seat since CBS took over.
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Leo Fender and George Fullerton (a long term employee at Fender) form G&L guitars (George and Leo). -
During the early 80’s CBS also recruited three top executives from Yamaha Musical Instruments. John McLaren, William Schultz and Dan Smith.
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William Schultz practically shut down U.S production of Fender guitars. Focussing on reissuing limited edition high end “classic” pre CBS Fenders. -
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On the 5th of March, CBS sells up to the management group run by William Schultz for $12.5 million. The company name was changed to Fender Musical Instruments Corporation. However, the sale did not include many Fender patents, machinery and nor the Fullerton facility, which was sold separately. As a result, no U.S production was taking place. Only Japanese models appeared in the 1985 catalogue.
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no U.S production was taking place. Only Japanese models appeared in the 1985 catalogue. At this point after the sale. Fender Musical Instruments Corp. were roughly $11 million in debt.
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Schultz and a small group of investors comprising employees and external entities like Servco Pacific Capital bought Fender from CBS for $12.5 million and renamed the company into its present-day name, Fender Musical Instruments Corporation.
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Two years after U.S production was shut down, Fender open their custom shop in Corona California. -
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Fender moves their headquarters in Corona to Arizona, overseeing all its facilities, now on a global scale Including, the U.S, Mexico, Japan, France, Korea, China, the UK and Germany.
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Leo Fender passed away on a rainy day in March 1991. His private workshop at G&L remains largely untouched to this day. -
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Production of Fender guitars is estimated at 50,000 guitars a year. The company at this point is worth approximately $250 million.
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A new state-of-the-art 177,000 square foot facility is built in Corona, California and built on a nineteen-acre site, which at this time can manufacture 350 guitars per day.
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Leo Fender, Donald Randall, William Schultz and other key staff are inducted into the Fender Hall Of Fame. -
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The company launched Fender Digital, connecting players with a vast digital ecosystem of products designed to elevate their musical experience. Fender Digital has introduced Fender Tune™ and Fender Tone™ for iOS and Android and debuted the groundbreaking app-based learning platform, Fender Play®. Combining expert instruction with the latest technology and research, the platform has single-handedly revolutionized the experience of learning to play guitar, bass and ukulele. -
Fender released an advanced line of guitar pedals, offering players a range of dynamic tools designed to expand their sound and capture some of Fender’s most iconic tones.