Saw this discussion elsewhere but thought it was interesting. There are four heads of the US founding fathers carved on Mount Rushmore. If we had a guitar history version, who would be there? In terms of developing the guitar my choices might be...
C.F. Martin - for developing and/or popularising X-bracing
George Beauchamp - for developing the first commercial electrified guitar-type instrument and patenting the single cone resonator
Doc Kauffman - for the Vibrola on the Rickenbacker Electro-Spanish Ken Roberts guitar, and
Leo Fender - of course for developing the first production line electrics and everything after...
But what about developing guitar playing? Maybe...
Charlie Christian (though my personal fave jazz player was Wes Montgomery)
Davy Graham (or another of the 60s folkie boom players?)
Jimi Hendrix
Eddie Van Halen (perhaps looking a bit sheepish given the level of bad taste hair metal playing he unleashed throughout the 80s and beyond...)
Thats much trickier... over to you guys...