I’m new here but decided to register to give y’all some info on the Crown City brand. I inherited a Crown City Martin knockoff a couple of years ago and searched for some time to try and find out what it was.

The guy who owns the Truetone Music guitar store in Santa Monica CA finally solved the mystery for me. There is a Pawn Shop in Pasadena CA called Crown City Jewelry and Loan (I think) and in the 70’s (and maybe 60’s) he was selling huge amounts of guitars. At some point he decided to simply start importing guitars under his own company banner. Hence the name Crown City imports. Don’t know who actually manufactured them but this is, apparently, for whom they were manufactured. Pasadena’s nickname, by the way, is the Crown City.

My Crown City acoustic is a relatively nice acoustic that stays in tune pretty well and is fun to play. I don’t use it often but usually take it if I’m going camping or knocking around and don’t want to bring one of the nicer guitars.

I hope this helps to solve this little mystery.