Old Tackle Boxes and Artifacts
I have often
wondered if it is possible that we are making a terrible mistake in
the way that we are collecting fishing tackle. Is it possible that
sometime in the future collectors will relate how careless and
destructive we were? Will we be denigrated the same way “pot hunters”
are by American Indian archeologists? These questions have been
nagging at me for several years.
Almost all
tackle collectors have at some point in their searching found a tackle
trove intact. At that moment we hold a fisherman’s outfit as he was
using it 50, 100 or 125 years ago.
Early in my
collecting I found many intact tackle boxes and bundles of rods and
reels. Who wants an old steel casting rod? Just remove the reel, give
away the rod, or put it in a corner somewhere. Then you go through the
tackle box and pull out all the good lures and keep, sell, or trade
them for other things you want. I believe this is still what most of
us do today.
Is this a terrible
mistake? Are we destroying a valuable insight into how our fishing
tackle was used? Whenever I notice eBayers selling those large single
action trolling reels and calling them large fly reels, it is obvious
that they have no idea how they were used. If the reel was still
mounted on a bamboo boat rod, with wire line on it, most of them
should be able to figure out how the reel was used.
One-hundred
years from now will collectors ponder why the finger lever on an early
Y&E automatic fly reel is turned away from the line guide? If the reel
is still mounted on an 1800’s bait rod it might become obvious that
the reel was used for trolling, not fly casting. I own the hard rubber
Y&E reel that was mounted on the Conroy bait rod shown to the left,
and luckily, I was able to buy the outfit intact.
Several years
ago my wife, Marilyn and I drove to the first tackle show held in Las
Vegas, Nevada. Since we were driving I
decided to take a display with me. It was a display of bass tackle
from the 1860s to the early 1900s. There were 6 different rods with
reels mounted that illustrated the evolution of bass tackle of over
100 years ago. These outfits ranged from a 14 foot wooden rod with NY
ball handle reel, through a beautiful Henshall rod and black bass
reel, to the Chicago frog rod of 1900 with a Shakespeare twin-screw
level wind reel.
We also had
period tackle boxes stocked with hooks, line, floats, and lures. I
love this period, and enjoy displaying items from it. I was amazed
that this display received more comment from the show goers than any
display I have every shown before or since. Many had never seen a
Henshall rod, or didn’t realize how they were used. They had never
considered that bait-casting reels got their name because of their use
– casting bait. There were no plugs to cast back then.
The interest
this display generated inspired me to take a similar display to the
Old Reel Collectors Association National Convention a year later in
Dowagiac, Michigan. The display was again
well received and won first place in the display competition at the
convention.
Certainly we
can’t save all the caches we find intact, but it seems to me that we
should try to keep some rods, reels (with line on them), and lures as
we found them. This might allow us, and future collectors, to better
understand how the tackle we collect was used.
Phil White - 12/06
