Hermann Dolling Jr. guitar

[RTRN]

Hello,
My name is Artur and I'm really glad that I found this Forum

I have this instrument from my uncle and he kept it somewhere in his basement for years.
The guitar itself is unplayable because of the damage it sustained. But there is some glimpse of hope that it will be restored someday

Anyway, I'm very curious about the age of the guitar and what it looked like in it's better days. The "moustache" bridge was replaced by another one with the tailpiece and only tailpiece remained. I wonder how the original bridge looked like so I have any reference for future restoration.

I search all over the Internet with practically no success and there is very little information about Hermann Dolling Jr himself (of what I could find myslelf). The most common from his instruments are violins, double basses or harps. It seems like the guitars weren't his major work.

And here it is - your Museum and your Forum
I hope I can find someone here who can help me a bit with gathering information about my guitar.

Some pictures:






Any help will be much appreciated!

Best regards
Artur

[Taylor_T5-S]

Hi Artur,

cool guitar you got! I love the label inside! Here is the head of a paper receipt from 1912, so that gives you an idea when he was active. As far as I found, Hermann Dölling Jr. lived from 1862-1923. So I'd guess the guitar is somehow from the 1890s to 1910s...

Unfortunatelly your guitar would need a lot of restoration, you need to remove the neck, you neeed to remove the back of her to get to the shifted neck block and reset the entire neck block area, glueing and cleating all the cracks and so on. Money wise I'd guess you are talking >> EUR 1.000 in repair value to get her in playing condition...Just add the hourly rate of a luthier times the hours such a repair needs...Sure for a heirloom guitar it's often worth it but don't expect it to be a great playing guitar again. It was a small parlor guitar to begin with.
The back and sides of the guitar are mahogany and the top spruce.

Also 2 newspaper ads from roughly 1910:

Ralf

[RTRN]

Hi Ralf,

thank you so much for your response!

So it seems that founding something like picture or drawing of that particular guitar model can be very problematic if not impossible?
I didn't expect it to be some expensive instrument, but nearly non-existent informations makes it pretty unique.
And even if the exact date of production of these guitars won't be known it clearly is over a hundred years old. Wow!
Having such a piece of history in hands is something really amazing!

As for the restoration I know it will cost much to repair or try to repair her but I think it's worth it.
Even if the sound won't be great I think this instrument deserve to be at least preserved in one piece looking the best it can

Thank you for the paper and the ads! They look very elegant and also contain valuable information!
I wonder if there are any pictures of the factory building because I don't think it's still standing.

Best regards
Artur

[Taylor_T5-S]

I wonder if there are any pictures of the factory building because I don't think it's still standing.

Actually the buldings still exist in Krumme Strasse 10 in Markneukirchen but the instrument business was closed already around 1923 when Hermann Dölling Jr. died. Afterwards starting 1923 a Walter Dölling (maybe his son?) had a business of producing gut strings for instuments there and during East German (DDR) times they produced suture material for surgery. The Walter Dölling & Co. KG, special factory for surgical sutures was expropriated in 1972 and converted into the VEB ASEPTUR surgical sutures. (VEB = state-owned enterprise).

After the wall came down in 1989, later the building was declared a "Cultural monument in the Free State of Saxony".
They say the house was built around year 1900, so that means your guitar was built after 1900 if the house was already on the label. The letterhead I had posted above was from 1912, so I'd say anything between 1900 and 1920 is possible.

There is a low resolution picture taken in 1994:

Unbenannt1.JPG (22.23 KiB) 9253 mal betrachtet

Unbenannt2.JPG (31.88 KiB) 9253 mal betrachtet

Maybe one of the members here who live in Markneukirchen could take a picture how the buildings look today...


Ralf

[RTRN]

Now this is some awesome news!
Very good to hear that the building has been preserved by becoming an cultural monument.
It's very elegant and stylish and have a long and diverse history.
(A history that I'm connected to by a little thread having this guitar )

Unfortunately I can't see it by the Google Street View so any pictures would be great

And that's some another info in the case of guitar's timeline.
I tried to find any piece of an catalogue that Dölling's company advertised, but I found only an old auction with the accordions' catalogue.
Maybe someday the one with guitars in it will appear somewhere.

I found on Google Maps that there is a Heinz Dölling's store in Markneukirchen and it's near the Museum. Is there any possibility that he is some relative or Hermann? I wonder if the store is still active, because maybe I could get in touch with someone who's running it.
I read somewhere that Heinz died, but maybe he had a family that know or remember something more about the Hermann's business (if they are related, of course).

Thank you so much!
Artur