I don’t have many pictures of these first two Walloons. After I heard Allen Shelton play a 5 string Dobro several years ago, I began my quest to make a banjo with a similar sound. In the early days, I tried everything I could stick into a wooden body. I tried car license plates, cookie sheets, parts of cooking pans, and a whole lot of other things which I can’t remember now. I finally decided that a traditional Dobro cone and cover plate would be the best. Little did I know that 35 years later I’d discover that the original 5 String Dobro had a National type cone in it instead of a Dobro type cone.

I built 2 of these Dobro pots with a banjo neck. Here are some pictures of the first one.

Some more pictures above of Walloon #1. A friend of mine used to tell me that if you were out in the woods and heard something that you couldn’t identify, it was a Walloon. Since this thing had a different sound, that is what I called it. I built two of them with a traditional Dobro cone and spider. I sold one to Warren Cornelius and traded the other to Slim Johnson.

Here is a picture of Slim’s Walloon. This is some of the prettiest curly maple I’ve ever had.

Another picture of Slim’s Walloon.

I later got interested in wooden topped banjos and then that evolved into the Frog Banjos. It has been a long journey and a lot of what I made through the years was destined for the scrap pile. Some parts of my failures could probably be found in the woods behind my shop. I used to pitch a lot of stuff out there when I was frustrated with it.

 

 

Here is a more recent picture of Slim’s Walloon. You can see how much the finish has aged.

 

 

Walloon # 2

 

 

The neck on this instrument originally had a hidden 5th string on it. This necessitated an extra peghead hole.  When I converted it back to the traditional 5 string neck, I ended up with an extra hole. I put a grease fitting in it just for fun.

 

Here is a picture of the home made tailpiece. It is made from aluminum. As I stated earlier, I recently discovered the error of my ways and built some 2nd Generation Walloons with a National type cone in them. There is an article on this website explaining these newer, second generation Walloons. It is a long article but it explains the evolution of this instrument and the building process pretty thoroughly.