Estate sale find this morning!

[Bob Gnann]

Found this nice old bowlback this rainy morning.
The maker on back of headstock says "Geo. Bauer Philadelphia". It has 31 staves and is structurally sound. The neck appears to be mahogany with a overlay of mahogany on top of the peghead. The tuners are 4 in a row with brass plates. Fret wear on first two strings is minimal and only on first 5 frets.
No fret wear evident on 3 and 4 strings. First and second strings (2 each) are still on the instrument under minimal tension. Tail piece has "Pat. May 15 - 94" stamped in.
I intend to get some ultra light strings and tune it up, but first I'd love to get some feedback from our bowl back experts.

[Jim Garber]

From the photos it looks like it is in good shape. I am only looking on my phone so hard to see if there are any issues. What else do you need to know? Bauer built mandolins for SS Stewart. There are some labeled Stewart & Bauer.

[Bob Gnann]

Hi Jim and thanks for your response. I came to the mandolin world via the bluegrass route so my interest in bowlbacks was really minimal. Anything I'd ever seen was in poor shape, missing parts, etc. and not worth buying. This one is structurally sound and just needs a new set of ultra light strings to be made playable. There is very little evidence of use and only a few very minor nicks. I'll give it a gentle cleaning too.
I entered Bauer in the MC search and came upon your thread started in 2004 Bowlbacks of Note. All 294 pages! I'm working my way through it and it's really fascinating to see the history of mandolins pre 1910 ish. We sometimes forget that this started with the luthiers in Italy and evolved from there.
A nice playable piece of mandolin history.