Ron1

Eyes from the side; ears from the front/back

Looks like "Sen." (Senior) to me.

The Emperor has no clothes.

Looks like a bridge has never set foot upon it.

And the bridge.

Maybe his father installed the fingerboard. Gotta love the tail-piece!

This is unmistakably a David Burgess violin. It's just that he didn't get to put the finishing touches on it after hoggin' it out with his sawzall.

The scroll fluting falls a little short of the "bitter end".

The first word could be Trash...

I know persimmon was not one of the choices, but..

You need to do everything possible to make potential buyers want to have YOU, not just your violin. Even if I made the best sounding instrument ever, I doubt anyone would want to own a Ron1. Effort needs to be made toward advertising and making your name known. Capitalize on your successes. If successes aren't happening, you have to make them happen. My icon guy made good instruments, but he was a master at promoting himself. As many makers did, and likely still do, he employed various clever, if not marginally shady, ploys to this end. If you can get your $5k violin into the hands of a recognizable symphony orchestra violinist for $0, that's $5k well spent on advertising which would benefit in promoting yourself for the rest of your career. Good marketing will sell even second-rate instruments, but with an absence of good marketing, a maker of excellent quality instruments will never be "successful" in their lifetime.

Found him on Ancestry. Apparently a hobbyist/maker. Worked all his life as a "paper ruler" in a book bindery. Probably explains the fancy label- similar to labels often found in books.

Is it possible that the first one was a slip of the knife?

Tsk Tsk, George. Will you never learn? :-) But in answer to your (legitimate) question, insects will go for certain "papers", especially those made from animal hides such as parchment, for the protein they contain. Oddly though, they do not care for animal hide glue, but do like paper that is adhered with vegetable glue or paste, probably mostly for the food value in the glue, and the paper suffers "chewed-on dog-eared" damage in the process.

Of course that is original shading. It has never been stripped and re-varnished.

Come to think about it, I remember turning in a book report I wrote in reverse when I was in High School. What does that reveal about me? Never mind.

I believe DaVinci occasionally wrote things in reverse too. What does that reveal about him?

Mirrored image?

Appears as though the handle may have have been moved.

I have never made an instrument, but I have named many. In researching the work of Knute Reindahl, I have "discovered" interesting and important facts about a good number of his instruments that I have subsequently named- often after their owners, or a significant past owner. When he died (the story goes), he left each of his 5 daughters one of his instruments (actually, they finally had to litigate in court just which instrument went to which daughter). Each of those instruments now has a name, such as the Miss Ruth, the Miss Olive, etc. A few are named "Ex _____" after well-known owners; A few are named after their carved heads and decorations, such as "the Magus" for his carved head of a wolf in sheep's clothing (the wolf's clawed feet protrude at the sides of the sheep's face) (Magus, the singular form of Magi, being a root word for magician, or in this case, a trickster).

I doubt the term "master violin repairer" as used in the obituary was meant to imply it was a title; the term "master" is often used involving lutherie, such as when describing a "master" or "apprentice" when speaking of a teacher/student situation. Sometime in the past, perhaps, the "master" was titled, but not in this case.

I didn't see any photos, irobot stated that in their post I quoted.

Does anyone know the publication date of this poster?