Nothing was held onto for posterity, they used pieces as-needed.
Well, that makes sense. I don't suppose they were sitting around in the lunchroom eating bacon sandwiches and chain smoking while they talked about the awesome, classic instruments they were building. "You know fellas, we ought to save some of this wood, it'll be very valuable in 50 years!" They were probably talking about their lawn mowers (or snow blowers), fishing poles and rifles.
So I guess I'll just have to stop having visions of some dusty stack of 60 year old mahogany slabs jammed into a sagging, rusty rack out in the far corner of the Nashville parking lot, where all the old office chairs are stacked up. ;)
It's too bad though, that would be pretty awesome. And I'll bet that someone, somewhere has a stack of wood like that squirreled away. Some crusty old woodworking hoarder in Ohio. And his family will probably burn them in the fireplace when he dies...
real 1959 pots/caps/and PAFs
I've never bought in to the idea that pots and caps hold any special magic (a.k.a.
mojo), since electrical current is electrical current. A capacitor's tolerance will certainly fade over many years (they are the first thing you replace when you pick up any vintage audio gear). But all you'd have to do to match vintage faded specs is measure an old one, get the value, and stick in a new capacitor with that value and,
viola!, you've replicated the circuit.
Though I'm sure there are a million people who know more than I do and own more expensive guitars than I do who would involuntarily spit out their brandy at such a preposterous idea.
I'm not saying that electronic components don't affect sound, they do (and sometimes they
create the sound). But capacitors, specifically, are a weird component to hang something like specific
sound on.
Pickups though, those are more difficult to replicate, what with the magnetics and the way the magnets interact with the specific wire over time and all that voodoo. But I think the good pickup builders have come pretty close. And I sure haven't owned any PAFs, but I have read that they weren't all winners...some sounded a lot better than others. You've owned some, you tell me. And there are those pickup manufacturing "mistakes" that created unique sounds. But it makes sense that they wouldn't all be great, considering the specs were so variable when they (hand) made those things.
I don't know how I got myself into a position arguing that old guitars weren't special when I think they are. Ha. Maybe I just think it isn't any one part, but the amalgamation of all those parts and all that playing over all that time that make them great. And we've talked about the smell. You can't beat the smell. ;)
I mean, the Doc Marten factory couldn't replicate these boots I've been wearing for 15 years (not continually, thank you). Though maybe a skilled boot forger could make a pair that looks similar. But the smell? Can't copy that.
Speaking of smell and old electrical components, have you heard
the pedal that replicates an old oil drum reverb? It's pretty cool. I don't know if it sounds like a genuine old oil drum reverb, but then it isn't as toxic or dangerous as one of those, so it has that going for it.