More autographs, and then a trade

Over the next few years, Byrd’s teams frequently were feted, and Konter made it a point to get the autographs of more important people on the ukulele.

Coolidge, Lindbergh and Teddy Roosevelt Jr., who was secretary of the Navy, all signed it. So did Helen Mack, the lead actress in the movie “Son of Kong,” in which she plays a ukulele; musician Harry Armstrong, who wrote the music to the barbershop quartet standard “Sweet Adeline”; and Charles Frohman, a major producer of Broadway shows for whom Konter likely arranged ukulele music during the Roaring ’20s, which Boak said was the pinnacle of the ukulele.

He stopped adding to the collection about 1930.

Boak said his and Bartram’s research found Konter established correspondence with C.F. Martin III during the 1920s, when Konter wanted to be a ukulele dealer. The company really didn’t do that — it required dealers to have its full line in stores, Boak said, and “Konter didn’t have a store; he just wanted to buy ukuleles cheap.”

Konter didn’t marry until he was 70, to Joanna Cohen, whom he romanced when he was 36 and she just 17. Boak said Konter proposed to her on the night before he left for the North Pole expedition, but Cohen’s “father said, ‘Absolutely not; he’s too old.’ ” While he was away, one of his friends, “Battleship” Bill Poole, who also signed the ukulele, married Cohen.

“It kind of broke Konter’s heart, but he became friends with them before they were married, and he stayed friends with them throughout their marriage,” Boak said.

Konter and Cohen married after Poole died and were together for more than 20 years until his death.

Boak said Cohen “was a great musician and she wanted a Martin guitar.”

“In 1952, Konter ... proposed trading the ukulele for a Martin D-28. Which in hindsight was clearly to Martin’s advantage,” Boak said. “I’m sure Konter placed a high value on the ukulele, given the effort he placed into it. But he was an older man. He was probably worried about what the future of the ukulele would be and he probably thought that Martin would understand its value and take good care of it.”

In Martin’s hands, the ukulele promptly “went into a closet for probably a decade or two,” Boak said.