❌SOLD❌ Fender Telecaster Rosewood Neck Blonde, 1966

The Fender Telecaster has to be one of the most influential musical instruments ever produced and has the longest continual production run of any electric guitar. With the groundbreaking Fender Precision Bass, these instruments changed the way music is presented, and their success is partly due to the solid reliability of the design. It’s been produced with a number of variations over time; the first big change was the availability of a rosewood fingerboard in the late 1950’s.

Sporting the classic blonde finish, this Fender Telecaster was built during 1966 at the Fender plant in Fullerton, California. At this point, CBS had purchased the Fender companies so this is an early CBS era instrument. It is in largely original condition though the neck pickup has been changed to a Duncan Antiquity and the switch has been replaced (the originals are in the case).

The body is ash with the original blonde finish, with a fair amount of authentic play wear off the back. We’d applied a finish-quality rating out of 10 to the previous post, of a 1966 maple neck tele, which has considerably less play wear. This one might be a 2/10, but it may be that gauging vintage finishes is like golf scores where lower numbers are more desirable.

The maple neck has a 1 19/32 inch nut width and of course a 25.5 inch scale length; the frets are original and somewhat low with light to medium wear. The decal is original as are the ‘double line’ Kluson Deluxe tuners. It plays well and has the classic Telecaster snap and spank.

This Fender Telecaster Rosewood Neck Blonde, 1966 is provided with the original hardshell case; the Fender logo is broken and half is missing.

Overall, this is one of the nicest Telecasters we’ve seen for some time. It looks like it’s been used as intended, taken out for decades of dates and worked hard.