Ditson

Oliver Ditson & Co.
The company started out as Parker & Ditson in Boston in 1837. Oliver Ditson brought out S.H. Parker in 1842 making the name Ditson, then in 1857 with extra directors it became Oliver Ditson & Co. which it remained until it was taken over by Theodore Presser Co. in 1931.

The main business of Oliver Ditson & Co. was music publishing and as this was well before any form of music recording, music publishers had shops where they sold the sheet music they published and also musical instruments to play the music on. This meant Oliver Ditson & Co. had a number of shops; certainly one in Boston, one in New York and one in Chicago, (there may have been more), and in these shops along with the sheet music they sold a range of instruments, including Mandolins, Guitars, Banjos and Ukuleles.

Oliver Ditson & Co. themselves did not make musical instruments, though as the company that sent George Lyon and Patrick Healy, to Chicago originally and lent them the capital to start their own manufacturing company they may well have been shareholders?

Oliver Ditson & Co. had their own brand Ditson and had other companies make them. One of the main suppliers of Ditson branded instruments was Martin and it was Oliver Ditson & Co. that was the main reseller for the first Martin Ukuleles of 1906/7 and Oliver Ditson & Co. was one of the two firms that got Martin to start making steel strung Guitars. Oliver Ditson & Co. also got Martin to make a special custom wide bodied "Dreadnought" Soprano model specially for the New York shop, however the other shops sold standard Martin range, just branded Ditson

Not all Ditson Ukuleles were made by Martin, they sold quite a few Hawaiian made ones too, some of which were made by Kumalae who customised the sound hole rosette for Oliver Ditson & Co., (but they still had the Kumalae decal on the headstock).

Oliver Ditson & Co. also sold Banjoleles and I believe that Victory was the brand name for them. I have read that the actual Banjoleles were made by Regal, though all of the ones I have seen were made by Slingerland and I have also seen a Houdlett Nu Art with a "made for Ditson" label on it but this wasn't branded Victory.