Gene Autry Guitar Club

Yesterday I picked up 3 badges from the Toowoomba Collectors Fair. One was a standard Joan Read 2CH badge, I probably have 4 of them already. Another was this one which was a total guess. Gene Autry Guitar Club. If nothing else, it was interesting and I hadn't seen one before.

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I got a bit of time this afternoon to do a little research and I found that it was a guitar and lessons that you paid off, similar to the Smoky Dawson and Tex Morton guitars, but limited to 500 members.

The club was run from Sydney and I found ads on Trove for 1946-1948, Australian Women's Weekly (opposite) and local newspapers, Longreach, Ipswich and Maryborough.

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For me, the most interesting thing was that there were radio sessions by the same name on 4IP, 4MB, 4LG and the 4LG ads mention joining the club and getting a badge.

Longreach Leader 1946

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1947

Queensland Times 1947

Longreach Leader 1948

My good friend Paul Kelly, Country Music Collector, heard about my find and messaged me and advised that he had a Gene Autry Guitar Club guitar.  He imported it from the U.S.  I was surprised at how plastic it was and the cardboard carry case.  Not the quality of Paul's Smoky Dawson Guitar which I had seen previously.

Paul brought it to me today to allow me to take a couple of photos to add to this story.

Thank you Paul, appreciate that.

If you were a member of the Gene Autry Guitar Club, please email me via the contact page and let me know what it was like.

If you were a member of any of the Australian Radio Listener Clubs, I would love to hear about it.  I am currently working on a book of the clubs and it looks like including more than 300 clubs, but there are a few I have no information on.

Ian Grieve