Fender’s Legacy Big Enough for 2 Towns

Leo Fender, who died six years ago this month, is one of Orange County’s most famous names. He revolutionized the electric guitar, and the instruments bearing his name have become standard equipment for thousands of music groups. Scores of legends in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame have played his Stratocaster or Telecaster guitars.

Fender is certainly worthy of a museum in his honor. How about two museums?

The Fullerton Museum Center Assn. has high hopes for a museum dedicated to Fender. But chugging right along on a separate path, the city of Corona--down the road in Riverside County--has much the same idea. If all goes as planned, we’ll someday see two Fender museums just 20 miles apart.

Neither group sees the other as competition.

“I think ours will be more of a historical perspective,” said Joe Felz, director of the Fullerton Museum Center Assn.

The Corona museum, which will be sponsored in part by the Fender Musical Instruments Corp., will be dedicated more to the guitar than to its founder.

Both groups certainly have rightful claims to the music genius.

Fender lived in Fullerton most of his life, and that’s where he began his company. But he sold Fender Musical Instruments in the 1960s to CBS for $13 million. CBS has since sold it, and the company consolidated most of its manufacturing operations in the Corona area (though its headquarters is now in Arizona).

Dwight Duerr, Fender’s director of corporate services, says the company’s efforts have been concentrated on helping the city of Corona, because Corona is now the Fender instrument’s home. But the company is also happy to cooperate with Fullerton, he said.

“The people in Fullerton certainly have reason to want to pay tribute to Leo Fender,” he said. “And obviously there is a lot of Fender memorabilia [in Fullerton] that we do not have access to.” Right now the plans for both museums are in the early stages. “We’re only taking baby steps for now,” said Fullerton’s Felz. “We’re really just kicking around a lot of good ideas.”

But the ideas for both are intriguing.

In Fullerton, the thinking so far is to build a museum at Pomona and Wilshire avenues. That’s in the heart of downtown and just across the street from the Fullerton Museum. It might well be combined with a children’s museum. While nothing is definite--and no funds have been raised--Felz’s group did ask the city’s Redevelopment Agency to take a parcel of open land there off the market and save it for the Fender project.

In Corona, the tentative plan is for a museum in a redevelopment area of the city’s North Main Street.

Deputy City Manager George Guayante, who also heads the city’s Redevelopment Agency, said the museum would be just part of a music complex that also would include a performance center. The hope is that the museum itself will include many guitars donated by the famous artists who played them.

The Corona project, which the Fender company would help sponsor, appears to be larger in scope right now, covering several acres. The Fullerton project may end up at less than half an acre.

The Fullerton and Corona planners hope to get together in the near future to make sure they continue to live in harmony.

“We can foresee the two museums lending materials back and forth,” Guayante said. “I think we’ll get along fine.”

Around the Town: The Spring Home and Garden Show is back at Anaheim Stadium this weekend. New this year: Mastervoice, a voice-commanded home appliance control system.

By voice command, you can turn on the lights, open the drapes, start the coffee, turn on the TV and even start up the sprinkler system. Unfortunately, it doesn’t show much respect when you command it to do the dishes. . . .

Sunday is the 85th birthday of Pat Nixon, who is buried alongside her husband at the Richard Nixon Library & Birthplace in Yorba Linda. The Orange County Orchid Society will decorate the library grounds for the weekend with colorful and exotic orchids from various countries Pat Nixon visited as first lady. As always, admission to the library will be free that day in honor of her birthday. . . .

I’m always excited about great, nontraditional places to hold a wedding. If you happen to be among the many who have been married aboard the Queen Mary in Long Beach, ship officials have an offer for you: Renew your vows aboard the luxury liner June 1 along with a whole bunch of other people who were married in the same place. It’s $25 per couple and $10 for each guest you bring. You get champagne and cake with that. . . .

Emergency Squad: If you’ve ever had to call a paramedic for any reason, chances are pretty good that whoever showed up at your door got his or her training from Saddleback College. It has the only paramedic training program in the county. Of the county’s 600 paramedics, more than half were trained at Saddleback, school officials tell me.

And here come another 26. That’s how many will graduate from Saddleback’s latest class Friday. Most will work for the Orange County Fire Authority or one of the city fire departments here.

Wrap-Up: Just a few of the big names who have played Fenders: Buddy Holly, Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck.

Upon Fender’s death, Peter Schuelzky, general manager of the Guitar Center in Hollywood, said this about him: “Fender was a phenomenon. He created the guitar to which all other manufacturers try to conform. Everyone tried to copy the shape and sound. Nobody has been quite as successful.”