North American Instruments has its roots in a company founded in Millington Tennessee in 1961. Moved to Imperial, Missouri in the fall of 1963, sharing space in the corner of a race car garage, the company remained idle until 1967 when four solid body prototypes were built to obtain financing. These early models were finished with automotive paint products and sported tremolo tailpieces created by re-machining obsolete parts, once used on race cars. Unable to find suitable backing in the Midwest, most of the equipment was sold off and the patterns and designs moved to California. In 1982, a few instruments were built in California prior to the final move to Florida, in June of 1983, when North American Instruments acquired control, developed the high quality and unique philosophy of manufacturing fine instruments, moving the custom instrument line to a small facility in Florida. By the time they had moved to Florida in the 1980s  North American Instruments concentrated on hand-made, custom electric solid body guitars and bass guitars, many of which were designed and custom built to order.

Source: North American Instruments website (archived 2007)