❌SOLD❌ Fender Jaguar Olympic White, 1965

The Fender Jaguar appeared in 1962, and while it was based on concepts and parts used on the Jazzmaster, there were a number of design departures.

Like the Jazzmaster, the Fender Jaguar used an offset-waist body with comfort contours, and shared the same bridge and vibrato tailpiece design. And, the Jaguar sported the same Rosewood fingerboard, which by this time was a curved veneer rather than a ‘slab’ with a flat bottom.

However, the Jaguar sports a significantly shorter scale length – 24 inches instead of 25.5 for the Jazzmaster – new, better shielded single coil pickups and offered more complex switching options.  Like other models at the time, custom colours with matching headstocks were available, as seen in this Olympic White example.   The Jaguar caused a stir when introduced, but by 1968 sales declined and by 1975 the model was discontinued.

Here we’re looking at a Fender Jaguar in Olympic White with colour – matched head stock, built during 1965 at the Fender plant in Fullerton, California. This guitar has an L-series serial number plate, indicating that it was built between 1963 and late 1965. The date code on the heel of the neck reads 10JAN65B, where 10 is the type of neck, JAN and 65 the month and year, and B representing the neck width.

Leo Fender sold his company to CBS on January 5, 1965, so this is a very early transition guitar, where CBS had not made many changes to the production line; one of the first things to change was to ‘F’ branded neck plates. Because of the lack of production changes, early transition examples like this Jaguar are effectively ‘Pre-CBS’ models.

This Fender Jaguar is in original condition, with the flip-up mute from the front of the bridge removed, and in the case with the bridge cover and the original setup card. It has just been serviced by The Twelfth Fret Repair Shop.

The original Fender hard shell case is included.