[Steve DeRosa]

I'd be very curious to see some other pics, for several reasons:

• I'm the former owner of a '46 Epi Blackstone, and according to every authority with which I'm familiar they were discontinued in 1949 - while it's possible a 1950-51 example may yet surface, a '54 is well outside the parameters; if in fact there were any leftover bodies after the circa-1953 Philadelphia move they would have been repurposed, most likely as Zeniths (which boasted dot fingerboard inlays, as opposed to the parallelograms on the Blackstone, but used identical carved-top/laminated-back body construction)...
• The presence of both a hex-socket adjustment at the body end and the Gibson-style nut at the headstock suggests to me an unsuccessful (and poor) attempt at repair - as evidenced by your vain efforts to perform adjustments, the amateurish carving of the trussrod opening, and the imprint of a three-screw trussrod cover; prior to the early-50's all Epi archtops used the aforementioned hex-socket "thrust rod" (which was patented in the mid-30's, in response to Gibson's then-proprietary headstock-adjusted trussrod, and adjusted at the body end), with '50s models using a white single-screw cover design somewhat smaller than the imprint in the photo...
• The headstock inlay in fact suggests a 1950's Zenith - the Blackstone used a "stickpin" design, with a distinct point at the bottom rather than the "cloud" inlay visible in the photo...
• A pic of the label, showing the model/serial number/place of manufacture would be helpful in terms of establishing date - TMK all postwar Blackstones have a blue/white New York label and serial numbers below 61,000...