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G# trill keys were included on saxes built until approximately the mid 50s. The key is located between the F and E keys.
The highest serial # alto I have seen with a G# trill key is 4104. While 4549 is the highest serial-numbed tenor that I have come across in my travels. Both horns are circa 1954.

According to the price list and brochures I have in my research files, the high F# key was an option that could be requested as early as 1953.
In the later models—approx. 12000 and onward—the high F# was a standard feature on all the horns.
However, when Max Keilwerth designed his saxophones for Hohner, he didn’t place this key where other saxophone manufacturers did.
The Hohner President’s high F# is located along with the other left palm keys. In some ways it is very intuitive.

My former tenor #104xx is circa 1961. Its high F# key was an oddity that I never understood—and quite frankly never used. Why? The note was horribly flat. Over the years I spoke with other Phase 2, Hohner President owners who had high F# horns and they all said the same thing. Could this have something to do with the design?
Phase 2 horns have drawn & rolled tone holes. However, when it came to the high F# key, the tone hole chimney was straight on top, and appeared to be soldered in place, and not drawn at all.
- It’s almost like the high F# key was an afterthought, and to create it they just bored a hole in the body tube and soldered in a tone hole chimney.
- I wonder if its proximity to the double socket could have something to do with the intonation issues?
Sadly I don’t have any great photos of this feature on my former horn, and none of my hundreds of research images have any better photo than the one I can provide below. If I run into my old horn again, I will be sure to take a photo to update the following shot.

Another way the high F# key changed on the Hohner tenors was in their shape. It appears when Hohner redesigned the horns for Phase 3, they also did away with the extra curve around the high F key. The result was a straighter, but arched key.

The last change that is obvious in the high F# key between the Phase 2 and 3 Hohner tenors is the location of the tone holes. Although it is difficult to see, notice where the key cup is in relation to the Ges. Gesh. stamp. This likely explains the key shape redesign noted above.
I wonder if relocating the tone hole in the Phase 3 horns improved the intonation of the high F# at all? I have never spoken to any Phase 3 tenor owners, nor have I played a Phase 3 tenor so I can’t speak from personal experience.

The President altos underwent a similar evolution when it came to their high F# keys.
Unfortunately since neither of my Hohner altos has a high F# key I can’t photograph the tone hole, and none of the hundreds of alto photos I have amassed for our gallery show a photo of the tone hole in a Phase 2 alto. So at this point I have no way of knowing whether or not Hohner simply had a soldered, straight tone hole for its altos like it did for its tenors.
However, as you can see from the following 2 photos, just as with the tenors, both the location of the tone hole and the key shape changed from Phase 2 to 3.

Eyebrow key guards, such as those seen on King Voll-True II and the early King Zephyrs, and the Hohner’s German cousins like Hammerschmidt, Werner Roth, and even the JK Imperial , made the Hohner President more recognizable in a sea of more common saxophones.

Hohner’s legally protected—”gesetzlich geschützten”—(abbreviated Ges.- Gesch. on the socket of the horn), double socket, with a front-mounted thumb screw for tightening the neck, was introduced in the early 1950s.
Prior to this, the neck fastening screw of the Hohner Presidents looked liked it did on any other saxophones, as evidenced in this alto, serial number 24XX.

The President’s front-mounted, neck-fastening screw shown above, resembled that of both Dörfler & Jörka (D&J)—a German company that produced basically exact copies of JK’s Toneking and The New Kings models—and Hammerschmidt, another German company. Both D&J and Hammerschmidt were producing saxophones during the same time period that Hohner was.

The screw that holds the lyre in place is, like all elements of the Hohner President, a piece of functional art. The lyre screw is simply a slightly smaller version of the front-mounted, neck-fastening screw with its cross hatch (nail file) pattern.

According to both the brochures I have, and the horns I have catalogued, the C/D trill key was standard on all Hohner President saxophones. This key appears to date back to the earliest incarnations of the horn, but did get dropped later in the horn’s production.
To date the last alto I have seen with a C/D trill key is #124XX (1963). The last tenor I have seen with this extra trill key is #12508 (1963).

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