Over $80,000 worth of vintage guitars have been stolen from a Tulsa, Oklahoma guitar store, and now the owner, Drew Winn, is appealing for help in retrieving the missing instruments.
The store in question, Guitar House of Tulsa, was raided around 10:50 p.m. on Saturday night (January 6) and thieves made off with a haul of 15 vintage and high-end instruments, including several valuable Gibson acoustic guitars and an array of rare electric guitars.
Winn has since taken to social media to share the full list and serial numbers of the missing guitars, among them a 1954 Gibson J-200, 1969 J-160E, a 1996 left-handed Gibson Les Paul Goldtop, 2012 PRS Private Stock McCarty, and a 1979 Hamer Standard Flame Top Sunburst.
You can view the full list below, but suffice to say many of the stolen guitars are very distinctive – for instance, the lefty Goldtop reissue and Gibson Les Paul Custom in an unusual orange (aged ‘Kumquat’ Yellow) finish.
Guitars stolen from Guitar House of Tulsa, Oklahoma
- 2022 Gibson Dave Mustaine #DMV30
- 2012 Paul Reed Smith Private Stock Gray Semi Hollow #3584
- Paul Reed Smith McCarty Private Stock #3712
- Collings OM-2H #27853
- Bourgeois AT D Dreadnaught Sunburst #6899
- EVH '78 Eruption White with Black Stripes #0210
- Gibson Les Paul Custom "Kumquat" Yellow [aged to orange-ish] #CS2000014
- 1996 Gibson Les Paul Goldtop R6 P-90's Reissue [left-handed] #66396
- 1979 Hamer Standard Flame Top Sunburst [Explorer Shape] #0284
- 1987 Goodall KGC 299 #
- 1961 Rickenbacker 365 Capri Fireglo #AC296
- 1977 Gibson J-200 Natural #06142729
- 2008 Gibson Hummingbird [left-handed] #00588030
- 1969 Gibson J-160E #89234
- 1954 Gibson J-200 Sunburst #A23297
“I received a call from the alarm company to say that they were dispatching officers because the the alarm was going,” explained Winn to local news station, KOTV.
“By the time I arrived it was too late. I was hoping that the guys were maybe still in the vicinity so we could have a chat [laughs] and I could get my stuff back…”
While Winn describes the situation as “disheartening”, he says he’s hoping that with the help of the guitar playing community, he can recover some of his lost stock.
Joe Bonamassa is one of Winn’s customers and has also shared the list, encouraging his followers to help and, in the process, describing Drew as “one of the nicest most honest guys on the scene.”
We’d make the same appeal, and encourage you to keep a look out for the instruments on the list when browsing online resale platforms and, if you’re based in Oklahoma, the physical stores in the area.
“Of course it’s a crappy thing to have happened,” Winn tells KOTV, “But everybody really cares… [Ultimately we want] to recover the guitars and sell them to people who want to play them – and not steal them and sell them!”
Guitar thefts are unfortunately very common, but it feels in some ways like they’re getting more egregious, particularly as rising prices (both in the cost of living and high-end guitar market) make the prospect more tempting to would-be thieves.
Recently, over in Nashville, there was another particularly brazen – if lower value – theft in the form of a $3K Gretsch that was swapped out for a ‘dumpster’ acoustic in broad daylight.
For more information and updates, check out Guitar House of Tulsa on Instagram.
