Newfoundland country singer Bobby Evans fondly remembers his American Stratocaster guitar. It is an instrument he thinks of often and often with longing.
But it was stolen from the stage during one of his performances, and now, more than 40 years later, he wants it back.
Now, over 40 years after it was stolen from the stage at one of his performances, he wants it back.
Evans last played guitar in the 1970s during a New Year’s Eve performance in the old ballroom at the Airport Inn in St. John’s. He took the stage with his daughter along with the Stratocaster, a Hawaiian steel guitar and a mandolin.
He went to his room at the hotel after the show around 2am and received a call from the front desk shortly after.
“I just left everything on stage because they said there were security guards in the building. … I had been in bed less than half an hour when the reception phone rang. Says ‘Bobby, you should come out.’ She said, ‘I think someone broke into the ballroom and took some of your belongings,'” Evans told CBC News this week.
“In fact, my little steel guitar was gone. The mandolin and my cherished, beloved Stratocaster.”
Evans spoke to the Royal Newfoundland Constabulary, who told him they believed the theft was committed with the help of someone at the hotel. The door the thieves used to exit would not open from the outside, he said.
In January, decades after the theft, he called Facebook to try to piece together the instrument he’d bought from a Montreal catalog.
“It was probably the nicest thing I bought these days. And I’ve really thought about it a lot,” he said.
“I was a proud man when I got this Strat. And it’s still one of the most popular guitars of the time. I think about the Strat sometimes. I saw a Roy Orbison show the other night and he used one just like the one I had.”
Evans’ guitar is either an American 1967 or 1971 Stratocaster with a bright yellow finish, he said. It features a special white alligator leather strap sewn with the initials ‘FR’.
“Someone knows something. If I could just get a little bit of a lead on this, you know, maybe I could get the guitar back.”
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