: Pleased you are enjoying it Allen, it good it's
: with a guy who appreciates the history.

: If the Monaco 1133B, Carrera 2447 and
: "Siffert" 1163T are the
: cornerstone Heuers, what would be the
: equivalent guitars? I'm talking mass
: produced items here, not Mcqueens actual
: 1133, or one of Hendrix's guitars, just what
: the the rare/classic models?

: Watch, guitar comparison post would be
: interesting for some of us on the forum...
: (needs a thread of it's own)

: regards
: Shaun

Interesting question.

Here's a quick and dirty list of iconic guitars. These aren't necessarily the very rarest or most expensive (although all except the J-45 will set you back the price of a BMW or several for a clean example from a prime year.) nor the ones that sound/play the absolute best (although most players wouldn't kick any of these off the proverbial guitar stand.)

1930 Martin OM-28: This is the first "modern" Martin acoustic guitar, before this guitar, which was designed at the request of banjo player Perry Bechtel, steel string guitars looked pretty much like classical guitars, with the body and the neck joined at the 12th fret (making the body seem longer and the neck shorter) and a slotted headstock. The remarkably responsive OM was a very short lived model--from 1930 to 1933--and it wasn't until around 1990 that Martin reintroduced it.
(The link below, by one of the guys who helped to resurrect the OM, includes a picture.)

1937 Martin D-18: This is the an early incarnation of Martin's famous drednought design, named after a battleship. A very big guitar--huge in its day-- It's the most widely played acoustic guitar and the most widely copied design. It gave great volume and bass at a time well before the electric guitar. Bluegrass players, who have to compete with louder banjos, fiddles and mandolins in acoustic jams particularly like dreds, as do singer songwriters who favor their rich full sound. Me, I'm partial to the slightly more balanced sound of the mahogany bodied D-18, but the rosewood D-28 is almost equally popular.

1942 GIbson J-45: Gibson's take on the drednought features a "slope shoulder" design gives it a punchier sound. There seems to be something particularly "American" about the J-45, and it's predecessor the J-35. It's the guitar of choice of players ranging from blues legend Lightning Hopkins to bluegrass pioneer Doc Watson to Bruce Springsteen. Wartime examples of this guitar are called "banners" because they have a decal on the headstock saying "Only a Gibson is Good Enough." These were discontinued when rival Epiphone ran an ad arguing, "when good enough isn't good enough."

1959 Gibson Les Paul: Early electric guitars, largely played by jazz guitarists, had a problem. If you turned up the volume, the resonant hollow body that allowed them to be heard acoustically made them howl with feedback. Musician/inventor Les Paul (who still plays every Monday at Iridium in NYC, a must-see show) overcame this problem by bolting two pickups onto a railroad tie and attaching a neck to it.
The Les Paul, launched in about 1952, was an outgrowth of this idea. (Les Paul is fond of joking, "When I introduce myself to people they're surprised by two things. That' I'm not a guitar. And that I'm not dead.") The so-called "burst" Les Paul with its flamed maple top, Patent Applied For (PAF) humbucking pickups, and rather high price tag, was actually a very unpopular guitar when it was released, which is why original examples can command $250K and up. When Eric Clapton and Jimmy Page started playing them in the mid 1960s with large amps turned up to 11, that all changed.

1952 Fender Telecaster: The first production solid-body electric was designed as an assembly line instrument. Leo Fender designed the Tele in a modular way so that every piece could be swapped out. Even the neck was bolted on so that it could be replaced (rather than refretted) when the frets wore out. Introduced in 1949, this model was intially called the Broadcaster, but Gretsch threatened a lawsuit because they made a drum with the same name, so Fender hastily clipped the name off the decals--a short run of so-called "Nocasters"--and then renamed it the Telecaster. Its twangy sound particularly appeals to Nashville country players, although plenty of rock icons---Springsteen, Jeff Beck, and Keith Richards--also play Teles.

1954 Fender Stratocaster: The Stratocaster--or Strat, for short--was conceived as a deluxe version of the very simple Telecaster. It featured a built in vibrato bar, three pickups instead of two, and a sleeker more contoured double cutaway body. The Strat is the most popular and widely imitated electric guitar in the world, and was played by icons ranging from Buddy Holly to Jimi Hendrix.

Mark Knopfler obviously agrees with me (although this is hardly a controversial list.) Here's a photo of a portion of his collection featuring almost all the guitars I've mentioned.
Left to right: Gibson Advanced Jumbo (a rosewood predecessor to the J-45), Fender Stratocaster (mid 1950s vintage), Gibson J-45 (rear), Gibson Les Paul, National Duolian steel guitar (not mentioned in my list but it coulda been), 1950s "blackguard" Fender Telecaster, Martin D-28 (a new Knofler autograph model).