Page last updated June 22, 2024.
Almost every page from a total of 33 different company leaflets and catalogs with 31different editions of those catalogs have been found, with most copies being purchased by this site. A small number have been very kindly donated. Some catalogs are in very poor condition – consider that some are over eighty tears old! As a result, some pages have not been included, but the prices information has been included where at all possible.
The earliest is dated 1941 and the most recent is dated 1984. There are other catalogs yet to be located and any such contributions will be gratefully acknowledged. Where a catalog was updated, every update found is also shown.
The earliest promotional literature consisted of fold-in leaflets, small enough (approx. 3.5″ x 6.25″/90 x 160mm.) to fit within the product’s packaging. In about 1961, partly to accommodate the increasing product range, the company changed the catalog format to a 12″ x 9″ stapled, with between four and eight pages – with a few exceptions.
DeArmond catalogs were distributed through a number of musical instrument companies such as St. Louis Music Supply, C. Bruno & Son Inc., Maxwell Meyers Inc., Southland and others. These catalogs were, along with those of other musical instrument suppliers, bound together to create one composite catalog.
Some suppliers’ catalogs and leaflets were printed specially for this purpose, numbered sequentially, sometimes with different (non-DeArmond) individual model numbers and cut to smaller sizes, to suit the ‘Parent’ catalog. This sometimes resulted in information in the original catalog being excluded.
DeArmond’s own catalogs are presented in date order as much as possible, with the year of issue shown, where known. Dates shown marked * are estimated. Successive versions of some early fold-outs, including the 1948 Green and the 1955 Red, were reprinted to show price changes – some items’ prices being increased, while others were reduced. This is one of a number of reasons for difficulties in precisely dating some of the catalogs shown.
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- 1941, November – Silver fold-out, double-sided, showing FHC ‘Guitar Mike’
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- 1946, 1948 & 1953 – Green fold-out, double-sided, showing FHC ‘Guitar Mike’
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- 1948 & 1953 – Yellow fold-out, double-sided, showing Model 800 Trem-Trol
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- 1949-1951 – Single-page red leaflet, single-sided
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- 1955 – Orange fold-out, double-sided, showing Model 60 Tremolo.
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- 1949-1950 Blue foldout, double-sided, showing Model 900 for Bass Viol
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- 1957 dated Copper fold-out, double-sided, showing Model 700 Violin pickup
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- 1954 dated Red fold-out, double-sided, showing Model 1000 Rhythm Chief
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- 1958 dated Pink fold-out, double-sided, showing Ukulele
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- 1958 Purple double fold-out, double-sided
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- 1961/1962 Amps catalog, four pages
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- 1961* Pale green catalog, six pages
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- 1963* Pale green catalog with Epiphone guitar, four pages
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- 1964* Purple catalog, four pages
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- 1965 dated Catalog showing CF Martin guitar, eight pages
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- 1967/1968 dated Pale green catalog, eight pages
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- 1968/1969 dated Pink catalog, eight pages.
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- 1971/72 dated Olive catalogue Rowe DeArmond catalog, eight pages
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- 1972 dated Olive catalogue Rowe DeArmond catalog, eight pages.
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- 1973, Red & white Rowe DeArmond catalogue, pickups and effects, eight pages
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- 1976* Orange Rowe DeArmond catalog, eight pages
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- 1978* Black & yellow catalog, eight pages.
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- 1977* Red folder with five full-color double-sided loose pages.
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- 1978 dated Blue on white catalog, eight pages
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- 1980 dated Green catalog, eight pages.
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- 1981 dated catalog, four pages.
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- 1983 dated Black & orange catalog, four pages.
Steve Tosh joined DeArmond in 1975, eventually becoming CEO of the music products part of the company. During his time with the company, he was responsible for the design and introduction of a number of new products and for updating other existing products. The following catalogs show some products as produced by his company which he established after the closure of the DeArmond music products business. Some of these products were originally manufactured by DeArmond and are shown in the Amplifiers page of this site.
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- Items include Model 260 humbucker with built-in transducer, 240 humbucker with volume control, 230 humbucker, 130 single coil pick pickup, 3010 piezo transducer, 700 violin pickup, 500 mandolin pickup, 750-C ukulele pickup and 1300-B autoharp pickup.
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- Items include Model 1602 volume pedal, 1622 stereo volume pedal, 1630 optoeelectronic volume pedal, 1802 weeper wah wah pedal and TFS 100 footswitch.
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- Tosh Pro Audio leaflet, page 1
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- Tosh Pro Audio leaflet, page 2