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Special-ordered Gibson Les Paul Custom in excellent, all original condition including original case. It has two Patent Number Humbuckers and maple top. This guitar was special-ordered in 1965 and delivered in the Fall of 1966. Originally ordered by Bill Black, Elvis' original bass player, in 1965 before he died and delivered to Bill Black's Combo in 1966 after he passed. I HAD all of the original documentation of the original order including the receipts, with several payments made, from the Memphis music shop where it was ordered. Other documentation I HAD were the original blue cardboard Gibson Quality Control sign-off card, with the serial number on it, signed/initialed by every worker from each step of the manufacturing process, all the original hang tags, case key, MINT SEALED Bill Black Combo album with this guitar pictured on the cover. I still have an appraisal from 1992 for it for $60,000 from World Wide Vintage Appraisals in Cleveland, Ohio.

WHY DO I NOT HAVE THIS IMPORTANT ORIGINAL DOCUMENTATION: I've owned this guitar since 1987. I bought it from a mutual friend of Bill Black's neighbor. I still have this neighbor's phone number and have spoken to him several times. He refers to this guitar as a 1965. In August 1992 I was asked by a prominent vintage guitar dealer, who shall remain nameless for the time being, who was involved with the photo shoot for the 1993 Vintage Guitar Magazine Calendar, to send this ex-Bill Black 1966 special-ordered Gibson Les Paul Custom and my original 1958 Gibson PAF-powered Gold Top Les Paul to him to take to the photo shoot. He wanted me to Over Night it to him and he would reimburse me for the expenses and give me a dozen of the 1993 VG Calendars that my guitars would be pictured in for obliging. Since he was my "friend" and I trusted him without question, I sent them. Back then, Delta Airlines had a program called Delta Dash where you could take a package under 50 lbs. and they would put it on the next plane going to any city's airport where they fly to, for $50 per package. You had to BRING it to the Delta Dash Desk at the airport you were sending it from and the receiver had to PICK IT UP at the Delta Dash Desk at his local airport. So, I packed up both guitars, RAN to the airport, gave them to Delta Dash and paid the $100. They arrived in Dallas at 7 PM THAT EVENING. He was SUPPOSED to pick my guitars up at DFW at 7 PM. I started calling him to see if he picked them up shortly thereafter to see if all went well and my guitars were safe. He never answered the phone that night because he "was sleeping". Yes, I was kind of stressed out. He eventually picked up the guitars at Delta Dash at DFW and brought them to the photo shoot. I sent all the documentation and album with the Custom to be photographed as the historically important guitar it is. It's purportedly the only single cutaway black LPC made between 1961 and 1968. Larry Hendrickson from Axe-In-Hand, a PROMINENT dealer and collector from DeKalb, IL at the time, confirmed this at a guitar show where I had it on display, saying Gibson "only made three at the time in case the body split while installing the neck" and that he "knew of one of the other two, but didn't know where the third was". So, all was good thus far. BUT, when my guitars were shipped back, neither the documentation or album were included. I IMMEDIATELY called my prominent dealer "friend" and asked where this stuff was, did he send it back separately or what? He said he'd "look for it", but, then "couldn't find it". I wasn't reimbursed for the Delta Dash shipping charges and didn't receive the dozen calendars that I was promised, until I later ran into him at a guitar show. I ASKED for the documentation and album MANY times before I saw him, to no avail. When I did see him at the show, he gave me the $100, SIX of the VG calendars and the once mint sealed Bill Black album back IN TATTERS, AFTER I asked again. My 1958 Gold Top is pictured on the cover and June "centerfold" of the 1993 Vintage Guitar Calendar, but the Bill Black LPC or documentation and album are, disappointingly, not. Since then, I was nagging him to return the documentation for several years. I was told by several mutual friends that he "was being vindictive for some reason" and "keeping my stuff". I was also told by another mutual friend and VERY prominent British vintage guitar dealer that my "friend" used my documentation for another guitar he had made. I hadn't seen him for quite a while and stopped asking UNTIL I saw him at the Vintage Guitar Show in Costa Mesa, CA. I was working a booth at NAMM that year and the company's owner wanted to take a break and go check out the vintage show. I went along with him, as I was the one with the car. When I saw my "friend", the prominent dealer who took my documentation for this valuable one off LPC, alone in his booth, I quietly, discreetly, respectfully, NICELY went up to him in his booth and quietly, as to not draw attention, asked him nicely once again to return my documentation. His response? He SCREAMED at me, "It's MY word against yours !!!!!" and threw me out of his booth. EVERY time I've ever heard someone say, "It's my word against yours" in my entire life, it's always meant they were in the wrong, knew it and I was getting screwed. A few years later, this thief, I mean "friend" and "prominent dealer" had the audacity to come up to me, SMILING, at another NAMM Show in the booth I was working in with his wife and couldn't understand why I wouldn't shake his hand and was being as cold as I could be. The look on his wife's face said she KNEW there was a problem. I don't "glad-hand" and smile at people like this. It was all I could do to not jump over the table and give him the BEATING of his life right then and there in front of THOUSANDS of witnesses. The Truth be told.

If you should be someone with clout that buys this guitar, I will give you this dealer's name, he IS well known and, maybe, YOU can reason with him and get the documentation back for yourself. Before I shipped this guitar back in August 1992, I took 35 mm photos of all the documents. I was in the hardest hit area in SW Miami-Dade from Hurricane Andrew. Lost the roof and one wall of my house; my box of photos got soaked. I've recently gone through all the negatives, THOUSANDS of them, but couldn't find any photos of the documentation. I STILL have my box of photos from back then. They're mostly all stuck together. I'm going to try to separate them with a trick a friend recently told me about and try to see if I can find and salvage any of them. Funny thing is, I was out of town when Hurricane Andrew hit and had left the Bill Black LPC, my '58 Gold Top and a near mint '64 Foam Green Strat with gold parts on stands on the 2nd. floor. The roof came down AROUND these 3 guitars. AND, for some unknown reason, before I left town, I turned my 3 stacks of pinstripe 4x12 Marshall cabs, Bluesbreakers and '67 Super Leads and 4 earlier JTM-45s around facing the brick wall on the first floor. Not a bit of damage to anything guitar related. The IS a God and it's not the first time he's watched over me. Everything else? Destroyed or blown away. I'll also give you Bill Black's neighbor's name and phone number, if you'd like to speak with him about his ownership of this piece before it came to me.