In July 1963, Tom Jennings went to the NAMM show in Chicago for the first time. He was accompanied by two members of his sales team - Andrew Cameron and John (?) Willament - and a "full range of electronic equipment" (presumably with a JMI engineer to oversee the setting up). Quite where in the venue JMI mounted its display is unknown. The company's name does not appear in the published lists of exhibitors. But some space had evidently been arranged.

July 1963.

The principal result of Tom's trip was announced at the Russell Hotel Trade Fair in London in August - a deal to distribute the Thomas Organ Company's organs in the UK. This was a purely one-way arrangement. No report of sales of guitars and amplifiers in the USA at this time has so far come to light, though a Vox Continental organ had evidently been placed in the hands of the band supporting "Paul and Paula" in late 1963.

But Tom clearly had a campaign in mind, as he took out a trademark for "VOX" in the States in October 1963:

Detail from the published US Patent records - application filed on 11th October 1963.

Below, a piece in the American music press in February 1964. That the Dezo Hoffman photo was around 18 months out of date at the time does not seem to have been of great concern - the amps currently in use by the band are described briefly at the foot of the piece. The T60 is of course the 2x15" cabinet, which had no designation of its own in JMI sources. The name "T100" did not come in until 1968.

February 1964. Whether Ian Duncan, whose principal job was in the publicity department, travelled with the equipment on the USA tour later in the year (autumn) is not known. John Oram, an engineer in the R&D dept, went round the States with the amps in the autumn of 1965; and Charlie Cobbett did the first leg of the 1966 tour (overseeing the Super Beatle amps provided by Thomas Organ).

The major initiative came in the Spring / early Summer of 1964 when Jennings placed adverts for Vox in the American music trade press. The Beatles, Dave Clark Five, and Searchers had all appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show - The Beatles three times in Feburary, The Dave Clark Five twice in March, and The Searchers in April - and all had used Vox equipment, though the amplifiers had largely been positioned out of sight of the TV cameras.

Tom's main drive: to find a country-wide distributor for JMI equipment in the USA (rather than a series of smaller dealers / outlets).

American music press, March 1964.

American music press, March 1964. The success in the USA was of course the appearances on the Ed Sullivan show and the concert in Washington.

The various versions of the advert published in the UK can be found on this page.

Below, April 1964, the first full-page advert seeking a country-wide distributor placed by Jennings in the American press. A small image of this page was posted years ago on one of the bulletin boards (probably the Plexi Palace site, now long gone) - good now to have the source and date of this printing. It is likely that there were at least two other printings in other journals.

April 1964.

Reports of Tom's trip to the NAMM show in July 1964 seem to indicate that a country-wide distributor was still to be found. Negotiations will have been afoot though.

July 1964. The Milwaukee dealer mentioned is likely to be Zeb Billings.

The solution arrived at was that Thomas Organ would act as "exclusive" country-wide Vox distributor in America. The deal, probably hammered out in Chicago and the weeks that followed, was announced at the Russell Hotel Trade Fair in August. On the Fair, see this page on the Vox AC100 website,

Below, a picture published in the local Dartford press in early September '64 of AC50 Foundation Bass sets being packed up for export to the USA. Consignments were sent to Chicago and Sepulveda. Adverts in local Chicago papers indicate that first batches had arrived by the 17th September.

Early September 1964.

THOMAS ORGAN

It is perhaps worth saying at the outset that precious little official JMI or Thomas documentation relating to matters of shipping and distribution has emerged to date. Perhaps some will in time come to light. But one can certainly put certain things together.

Much of Thomas's early promotional material was based on material supplied by JMI - photographs that had been published in English catalogues, brochures, and magazines; banners for dealers to display, hang tags, standees; and of course technical information about the amps themselves - circuit diagrams, manuals, replacement components, and the like.

Initially Thomas distributed Vox equipment via its exisitng chain of dealers, for the most part music shops that principally handled pianos and organs (with some concession to "modern trends"). These became "exclusive" Vox dealers, even though very little exclusivity was involved in actual fact. Today one would say "approved dealer or agent". But "exclusive" was a word that Tom had come up with in the earlier 1960s, so it was simply taken up by Thomas in the USA.

As mentioned above, amplifiers were shipped by JMI to Chicago and Los Angeles (Sepulveda) in batches. Thomas distributed from there - a sort of rolling process: California and the Chicago area first, then further afield.

Two early adopters (endorsees) of Vox equipment in the USA were The Standells and The Sir Douglas Quintet, their names duly slotted into the longer lists of famous British Vox users. It took Thomas a while though to get other well-known American bands signed up. Meanwhile countless promotional and publicity photos were taken. But what really counted was having a band buy Vox equipment and use it on stage. This is where dated and securely documented pictures of performances are so important. The promotional shots (as below) are simply the Thomas machine in action.

Lord Byron and the Poets. Other bands were photographed in the same room with the same equipment. Picture from this superb site. Later on one finds sets of pictures of bands taken in front of two or three AC100s and one AC50.

In terms of promoting the amplifiers, Thomas Organ used the standard Jennings names at first - the AC30, AC50, AC100 and so on, the most popular models being the T60, AC50, AC100. The AC4 was regularly sold along with a Vox guitar by department stores as a sort of budget package. The AC30 Super Twin (in new slope-sided form) was passingly popular too.

In the late Spring of 1965, however, Thomas brought its own names, taken from some picture-book history of England, to the range - the AC30 became the "Viscount", and the AC30 Super Twin, the "Berkelely". In late 1965 and early 1966 the names were transferred to Thomas's new solid state amps.

In spite of Thomas's marketing efforts the AC30 Twin did not do all that well unfortunately. Not only was it over twice the price of a Fender Twin, but the Beatles, always pictured in adverts with two (in photos taken in 1963), had long stopped using them for guitar on stage.

Chicago, mid October 1964.

In Spring 1966, JMI-made amplifiers were to all intents and purposes discontinued by Thomas and the new fully solid state line made in Sepulveda promoted in their place. Old JMI-made stock continued to be sold though, and "exclusive" dealers still offered good deals throughout 1966.

Promotional and Service material

Below, the first Service Bulletin for Vox amplifiers issued by Thomas Organ, 4th December, 1964, explaining why fuses were blowing in early batches of amps that had been shipped to the USA, and how to remedy the situation.

The key piece of info missing from the sheet is that British and American fuses were rated differently. In the UK, a 3A fuse would blow at 3A. In the USA, the rating of the fuse indicated maximum continuous use for a specified period of time - 3A meant 3A for 60 minutes or something along those lines (60 minutes being the norm). This type of fuse was designated "AG" or "AGC".

Donald John remained service manager through to mid 1968, when Thomas Organ purged some of the more experienced staff (including Marv Kaiser) in its "Vox Division". .

Below, illustration and text for the AC30 Twin and AC30 Super Twin in the Thomas Organ "Million Dollar Sound" catalogue of late 1964 / early 1965. This catalogue was still current in Spring 1965.

The AC30 Twin.

The AC30 Super Twin.

At Sherman Clay stores in May 1965, the AC30 was $520 - a considerable amount. The 60 watts quoted was US peak power rating.

3rd May, 1965.

Promotions and competitions (organised by Marv Kaiser, head of sales in the Thomas Vox Division) played an important role in putting Vox in front of a teenage audience. The Battle of the Bands of 1965, part of the 4th Teenage Fair at the Hollywood Palladium, 9th-16th April, was the first of a series of major events put on by Thomas. On the Fair, see this page on the Vox AC100 website.

New names (from mid 1965)

As mentioned above, in mid 1965 the AC30 became the "Viscount" and the AC30 Super Twin the "Berkeley". Two Thomas catalogues ilustrated the amplifiers with these names - "The King of the Beat" catalogue (catalog) of mid 1965, and "The British Sound" catalogue of late 1965 / early 1966.

Thomas Organ, "King of the Beat" catalogue, mid 1965. On the back page, a number of photos supplied by JMI of the NME Pollwinner's Concert, Empire Pool, Wembley, 11th April, 1965.

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