Leo Fender

Leo Fender (1909–1991) was an American inventor and businessman who founded Fender Electric Instrument Manufacturing Company and designed influential electric guitars and basses.

Electric guitar: A guitar whose strings’ vibrations are converted into an electrical signal for amplification. Fender developed solid-body electric guitars that could be amplified loudly with less feedback.
Leo Fender's first guitar: A prototype solid-body electric guitar built by Leo Fender before the production Broadcaster. Its design experiments led directly to Fender’s first commercial solid-body guitar.
Fender Electric Instrument Manufacturing Company: The company Leo Fender founded in Fullerton, California, to manufacture electric instruments and amplifiers. It was the business through which Fender developed and produced his best-known instruments.
Electric bass: A bass instrument that produces sound through electronic amplification, commonly with four strings tuned like an upright bass. Fender’s Precision Bass helped establish the electric bass as a standard ensemble instrument.
Solid-body electric guitar: An electric guitar built around a solid, non-hollow body that supports its strings and pickups. This construction defines the Telecaster and Stratocaster designs associated with Fender.
Esquire: Fender’s single-pickup solid-body electric guitar, introduced in 1950 alongside the Broadcaster. It shows how Fender adapted the early Broadcaster design into a simpler model.
Fullerton, California: A city in Orange County, California, where Leo Fender founded his instrument company. Fender’s company and early factory were based in Fullerton.
Bass guitar: A fretted string instrument that supplies low-pitched notes in many popular-music ensembles. Fender’s Precision Bass helped define the modern bass guitar’s form and role.
Magnetic pickup: A transducer that converts the vibration of ferromagnetic strings into an electrical signal. Fender’s guitar designs relied on pickups to turn string vibration into an amplified signal.
Broadcaster: The original name of Fender’s two-pickup solid-body guitar introduced in 1950, later renamed Telecaster. It was the production design through which Fender established his electric-guitar approach.

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Guitar amplifierRelated: Fender developed influential guitar amplifiers alongside the company’s electric guitars.