Marco Polo POLO Three Quarter Acoustic Guitar Review

Alan Arnell

Reviews His Marco Polo

Three Quarter Size

Acoustic Guitar

-Alan Arnell

An old story for me; I was on an extended vacation and felt the want of playing a guitar.  Being guitarless, of course I found an old shabby ¾ size guitar for next to nothing and could not resist not buying the guitar.  When I got the guitar, I took off the remaining 3 strings and threw them in the trash.  The guitar was a Marco Polo and having a wide neck I purchased nylon strings at Guitar Center to make the guitar playable.  

Before I was able to string the guitar, I had to clean the dirt and filth covering my previously owned guitar.  It was coated in dust and the neck was crusty with some kind of gunk on both sides of the frets.  I literally had to use a soap and water with a scrub brush to clean the fretboard.  The wood was so dry, especially the fretboard, that I had to moisturize with it multiple coats.

The guitar is really old.  From what I could find out in research Marco Polo guitars were marketed in the late to mid 1960’s  

The tuning pegs or machine heads were corroded and I had to put WD-30 on them of all things.  The machine heads are of the type that consists of a capstan, mounted at the center of a pinion gear, with a knob and a worm gear that links them.  The saving grace of the capstan is that the gear that is turned by the worm gear is made of brass.  If they had not been brass the machine heads would have had to been thrown away.  As it is now the look like Holy Hell but to my amazement functional.

Besides being all scratched up, faded and weather beaten the guitar had at one time had the  neck broken off where it attaches to the body.  Under further inspection after the dirt was cleaned off I could see some previous owner of my guitar glued the neck back on with ELMER’S GLUE!  No joke.  When I saw the shabby repair I though, “That will never last with any string tension.” But, what do I know?  It has stayed together now for over a year, even with me playing it over for 300 hours.

The cleaning up process taken as about as far as the guitar would let me, I began to string it with the nylon strings.  I kept thinking of one of my Dad’s old sayings.  You can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear.”  And, with a snicker, I remembered my old Coach in high school, Coach Horton (who sadly just passed away the week of my writing this review) saying, “You can’t make chicken salad out of chicken shit!”  Well in this case he might have been wrong.

With the strings put on I tried in vain to tune the guitar.  I would get in tune and 10 minutes later  the guitar would be so out of tune It was unplayable.  I never really got to play the guitar on vacation because I got discouraged and the guitar getting out of tune so easily.  I packed it in the trunk and went home with my guitarist tail between my legs.

I don’t know what it was, maybe the moisturizing of the wood; the neck repair finding its own or the nylon strings finally stretched out, but finally the guitar stayed in tune.  On that same note.  I was playing away on my Marco Polo guitar when I started thinking, “... what is that smell?  Well, it was the inside of the guitar.  It smelled like mildew and mouse turds.   I sprayed the inside with a Fabrize. The Fabrize only masked the smell, so that when the Fabrize wore off the bad odor was still there smelling away.  I finally sprayed the inside with Clorox Disinfecting Bleach Foamer Bathroom Cleaner, that finally did away with the horrendous aroma.  The funny thing about the smell killing process was that the guitar went completely out of tune?

After attack with bleach, the smell was finally gone and in tune, I began to really like my Marco Polo guitar.  Not for the way it plays all that much, but because of the tone the guitar produces when played.  I can only relate it to an expensive Taylor Guitar I have played at Guitar Center.

The action (distance between the neck and the strings) is 1/4 of an inch.  Acoustic guitar are known for having a large action but this is ridiculous.  However, with the nylon strings it is not that much of a problem when playing chords.  Playing a lead part can get fuzzy and muted.  So, I use the Marco Polo when I want to strum out some chords of a new tab I am learning or just when I’m knocking around playing rhythm chords as I sing songs.  

As you probably guessed the Marco Polo ¾ sized guitar was a cheap guitar made for the beginner.  I may be the only person in the world that has one or likes is mellow sounding tone when played.

History of the Marco Polo Guitar

Marco Polo Instruments were built in Japan in the early 1960s. The guitar was named and distributed by the Marco Polo Company of Santa Ana, CA.

The Marco Polo product line offered acoustic flattops, thinline hollowbody acoustic/electric guitars, and solid body electric guitars and basses. These inexpensive Japanese-built instruments were the first to be advertised by its U.S. distributors, Harry Stewart and the Marco Polo company. While the manufacturers are currently unknown, it is estimated that some of the acoustics were built by Suzuki, and some electric models were produced by Guyatone. Source: Michael Wright,Vintage Guitar Magazine.  It also has been rumored that the Marco Polo was made by Kasuga in Japan.

Suzuki is also credited with making the Canora and Takeharu badged guitars along with Marco Polo acoustics.

Into Guitars

The budding bongo boom quickly expanded into importing drum kits made by Pearl. This, of course, made selling cheap guitars at the right place at the right time as many a retailer got int the new guitar boom.  Japan at the time was ready and willing to fill the void of intro guitars.  The problem was that Japanese guitars were fairly primitive at the time (such as the Aria?). Shiro Arai brought over some higher-quality Japanese acoustics in the early ’60s, only to have them explode when subjected to winter heating systems due to inadequate seasoning of the timbers.

In any case, around 1959 retailers began to see enough improvement in Japanese guitar quality they quickly begin importing. To assure quality, the retailers took an approach that would later be used successfully by some other importers. They offered the guitar makers more money if they’d improve the quality. This is what is known as the 80/80 quality test, a litmus test based on Sears-Roebuck quality standards. This meant that guitars had to survive 80 percent humidity at 80 degrees Fahrenheit for three to four days. Westheimer introduced the concept of a truss rod to Japanese guitar makers. And in 1959 sales began increase.

The truss rod is part of a guitar or other fretted, stringed-

instruments that stabilizes the lengthwise forward curvature

(also called relief), of the neck. Usually it is a steel bar

or rod that runs inside the neck, beneath the fingerboard.

This was not the first time retailers imported guitars from Japan, but it was certainly the first significant offering of guitars in the USA.  Some of the earliest Japanese guitars were imported and marketed to pawn shops.

The Marco Polo brand got going in 1959, if not earlier, and were imported with many other Japanese-made guitars, .

The story of the now rare Marco Polo guitar started as a production design under the direction of Guyatone House-Brands in 1958. It was built at the Suzuki Musical Instrument Manufacturing plant... in one of two factories located in Kiso and Hamamatsu, Japan.  Around 1958, Jack Westheimer, a pioneer of global guitar making, began to see enough improvement in Japanese guitar quality and figured... it was the right time to begin importing them.

Guyatone-made guitars may have also been sold under the following names, though not all guitars under the following label have been made by Guyatone:

Broadway, Conrad, Conqueror, Delta, Empire, Feather, Futurama, Ibanez, Kent, Kingston, Hy-Lo, Lancer, Lake, Lafayette, Marco Polo, Musician, Nobco, Noble, Orpheus, Orpheum, Raven, Regent, Roamer, Royal Artist, Saturn, Silvertone, Star, Starlite & Univox

For a complete History of Guyatone Guitars Manufacturers in Japan go to:    https://guyatoneus.com/history/

Most  Marco Polo acoustics were humble beginner guitars, which was their intent. Few reference materials are currently available regarding these early Marco Polos. However since the marketing source for the USA was in California, I assumed sales was mainly contained to the West Coast.  To further my assumption since I grew up in Illinois and lived in Texas for many years and never heard of Marco Polo. However, I may be wrong.

While doing research, I read a man’s commentary post about the guitars he had in his life  He is about my age and we both started playing guitar in the mid to late 1960’s.  The first thing that drew my attention was that he lived unknown to me only a few miles from my home in Illinois when I lived there in the 60s and 70s.  To my astonishment I read, “So I bought one (Marco Polo Guitar) from a pawn shop on Wells avenue, a nylon-string slot-head Marco Polo for $20.  Like most first loves, it was unsatisfactory. The strings were too high, the neck was too wide, it strayed out of tune, but it was my guitar.”  His statement makes me wonder if maybe Marco Polo was marketed across the USA, unless his Marco Polo meandered from California to the Midwest by other means.  That’s my guess anyway.

Above is an acustic Marco Polo I found on http://www.vintagecustomguitars.com/  

They wrote, “These are Vintage RARE 1960's Japan Marco Polo Acoustic Guitar for sale” $69

I also have been looking for Marco Polo Guitar for sale online.  I have found them to be far and few inbetween for sale.  In sporadic searching over a 3 month period I only found a full size acoustic and a solid body electric.  My search is not at all scientific.  So I will say hesitantly, that either Marco Polo Guitars were either small run products, that they were such intro guitars people have not kept for the last 50 odd years or they were so crappy the have not withstood the test of time and use since they were sold and have gone to the big guitar store in the sky.  

Here is a solid body Marco Polo I found on http://guitarz.blogspot.com/ .  They wrote:  Here is a supposedly rare Marco Polo guitar, made in Japan by Guyatone in the 1960s. It features four pickups (described as the seller as “very hot”), each having their own on/off selector switch mounted onto a substantial chrome pickguard. Other controls are a single slider switch for rhythm or solo that affects tone, and a single volume and single tone for all four pickups. The tremolo, which is still all present and correct, is said to work smoothly, leaving the guitar in tune after use. The adjustable neck has 21 frets on a rosewood fingerboard plus a zero fret, and has 8 position inlays. The guitar is obviously styled after offset waist guitars such as Fender’s Jazzmaster and Jaguar models. It is currently being offered for sale on eBay with a Buy It Now price of $595.

With the solid body guitar I found it interesting that they wrote, “...supposedly rare Marco Polo guitar…”  I don’t feel so bad about not finding more information about the Marco Polo brand i the professionals can’t as well.

Anyway, I have a cheap little intro guitar that despite its misuse and abused life somehow became a survivor.  I may be nuts, but I like my Marco Polo. Despite its pedigree and scratched-faded appearance, I have received much enjoyment from its ownership and and from the music I have crafted out of the guitar.  Would I tell you to go out and buy a Marco Polo Guitar? No, I would not.  Am I sorry I paid $30 for it at a second hand shop?  No I am not. Would I call it my Baby Taylor? I wish I could, yet the sound is almost there if not any thing else. My Marco Polo Guitar well, everything it lacks, well, I makes up in denial.

Me Playing My Marco Polo Guitar

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