'Antiques Roadshow' guest brings a unique guitar and expert gave it a whopping 5-figure valuation

Guests on "Antiques Roadshow" bring items either linked to their loved ones or to their passion, and this includes instruments and merchandise connected to musicians and movies. Mosrite was one of the biggest guitar companies in the country during the mid to late 1990s, and prominent artists like The Ventures had a design named after them by the company. Mosrite guitars sell for a lot of money these days, but there is nothing quite like an original model built by founder Semie Moseley himself. One of those was brought in by a guest on an earlier episode of “Antiques Roadshow,” and he got a hefty appraisal for it.

The guest claimed to have been friends with Moseley and Ray Boatright, one of the first and biggest investors of the company. He had purchased the guitar in the ‘80s, shortly after Boatright had been killed. The guitar was a prototype design, and the company’s founder had engraved his signature on the inside of the instrument. A few parts of the instrument had been repaired, but despite that, the expert said that it was worth $15,000.

“It’s strictly a prototype,” the guest explained. “This is all hollow. He (Moseley) called it a guitar with a built-in soul. Because it was chambered, it got a totally different tone. He made some very innovative instruments.” Innovative is truly the right word to describe Mosrite guitars. Unlike other companies, they made their guitars in an unorthodox shape and even had the pickups tilted instead of straight.

Moseley had quite an interesting story of becoming the owner of a successful guitar brand. He used to work at Rickenbacker. He was fired from the company after he was found using their parts to build his own guitar. After that, Boatright convinced him to keep making guitars and offered financial support to turn that dream into a reality.

This is not the first time a guitar has found its way to the show, and it won’t be the last either. In a different episode of the show, a guest had brought a beautiful 1941 C.F. Martin 000-42 guitar, which was also a family heirloom. It originally belonged to a musician named Cowboy Slim, who was big on the radio in the 1950s. After he passed away, the guitar went to his grand-nephew, who brought it to "Antiques Roadshow."

Slim had bought the instrument for just $50, which wasn’t a lot of money even at that time. The company was founded in 1833, and its products were considered to be a poor man’s pearl guitar due to their low price. It had a pearl inlay, and its back and sides were made with Brazilian rosewood, a sought-after type of rare wood with high tonal qualities.

Legendary musician Eric Clapton also used the 000-42 for one of his unplugged records. Had it not been for that, the model might have been forever lost to time despite being an exceptional guitar. The expert had said that the item would sell for a whopping $65,000 and $75,000 at the time of recording.