A Bit of Tom Anderson History...built right into this Guitar !!

[henryj]

Hello Everyone-
I am new to the forum, but I had to register to let everyone see a quite historical guitar (if the story is indeed correct), so your input would be greatly appreciated Tom.
I was working in a music store in Memphis, and a fellow employee had a guitar that he wanted to get rid of. Since I was working in a music store and didn't have any money I traded a 60's Fender Musicmaker (not pristine, but a fun player) for a body and a neck. The body was beautiful and the neck had no wear and felt like heaven. Unfortunately somewhere along the way someone decided they wanted to mount a p90 in the bridge position and cut a hole through the top of the guitar into the cavity where the switches and knobs mounted. This is most likely the reason that no one ever payed much attention to the guitar.
All I knew at this point was that the headstock was signed "Tom Keckler".

After doing some research here is the story:
Doing some clean up, I removed the neck and discovered it was a Tom Anderson neck with the Fender shaped headstock. The body was made by Schecter (Tom's old haunt) and was made from Imbuya. The signature on the headstock is one of two signed guitars assembled here in Memphis by Tom Keckler who (as the story goes) used to work with Tom Anderson at Schecter doing tone wood research. The Imbuya was the material that Mark Knofflers Tele's were made from.

I took the guitar back to T.K. to cut a strat pickguard to fit the guitar and cover the hole. That is where a lot of this infomation came from.

So Tom,
Is the story true? Did you work with T.K. at Schecter?
Could this be a pre-Tom Anderson guitar?

It plays like $1,000,000 bucks!

Thanks

[tom]

yes i worked with tk at schecter. he and tom stinson came out from strings and things in memphis to run the "custom shop" at schecter. we were making parts for a while and assembling very few guitars. they were brought out to build more guitars, partly to have guitars to sell, but also to show others what you could do with schecter parts. i don't think we ever made more than 5 guitars a week back then. schecter was making in the neighborhood of 35 bodies and necks a week for sale. then in 83 or so they sent me to japan to spec bodies and necks to be made there and assembled in van nuys. that was the beginning of the end. i was gone in mid 84.
is it a pre tom anderson guitar? that's a stretch since all we did was make the neck. i'd say it's a guitar assembled by tk, who in my opinion is about as good as it gets for guitar setup skills, and a great guy.