Gibson

Gibson was started in Nashville, Tennessee on October 11, 1902. Initially Gibson created Orville Gibson's original designs. Gibson was responsible for a lot of mandolin designs in the 20's. Orville Gibson (who was born in 1856, in Chateaugay, New York) started making mandolins in Kalamazoo, Michigan, United States. The mandolins were distinctive in that they featured a carved and arched solid wood top and back and bent wood sides. Before this mandolins had a flat solid wood top and a bowl-like back (kind of like a lute) made of many strips of wood. These bowl-back mandolins were very fragile and unstable. Disdainful of the shape, Orville Gibson called them "potato bugs". Gibson's innovation made a better-sounding mandolin that was a lot easier to manufacture. Orville Gibson's mandolin design, with its single-pieced carved sides and a single-pieced neck, was patented in 1898; it would be the only innovation he patented. Oriville Gibson died in 1918.