A little history lesson

In the earliest days of my recollection, my youth, and the days of paying my dues, I met some of the men that made the greatest contributions to surf casting as it exists today. There was little if any regulation on surfmen then, and you could ride virtually every stretch of sand year round. These guys had buggies of all types, shape, and size. My old man had an old panel truck, locker rear end, with balloon tires that he aired down to flats to get on the beach. For longer duration stays he had an old bread delivery truck, with rough bunks built in, and every piece of Coleman equipment you could get at the time. The vehicles had rod racks made from pine boards screwed through the metal, and spring clips to hold the rods. On the way to the beach, we would stop at the local ice rink and fill the coolers from the piles of shavings at the rear of the building.
There was a shop that we went to on the way to the shore, that carried only what you needed. A custom rod shop, Murat's Bait and Tackle. They had a big metal Striper, lit up with neon, that you couldn't miss as you drove down the old cart path known as rte 146. That road is now 4 lanes wide and constantly grid locked in front of where the old shop once stood.
Charlie Murat was a cantankerous old cuss, weather worn and wrinkled from the blowing winds and pounding surf he felt at home in. You could buy any reel you wanted from him, as long as it was a Penn. They distributed Harnell for the entire east coast, but sold the original Lammi's as well. They carried Gibbs and Atom lures, and eels. Many a time I was in the shop, Stann Gibbs and Bob Pond (Atom) would be standing side by side, coffee in hand talking about Bass with Charlie.
Dave Hammock, Charlies son-in-law, would be in the back turning rods, and overseeing the other guys doing the same. Dave was cut from a differant piece of cloth. Charlie didn't especially take to kids and thought they were nothing more than a nuisance. Dave would take me under his wing.
By bicycle I would ride to the shop, around 4 miles from my house, and pull up to the back door. I would peek in to see if Dave was there, and make sure Charlie was out of sight. If I could get through the door, and make it to the stool near Daves bench I was golden. Charlie would let me sit there as long I made it in without him seeing me.
All the contract builders in the shop, paid by the rod, did all the production work. Charlie, Dave and Butch, did all the custom rods. They were the ones that tailored to the the guy that was buying it. They also had more thread work, and made the stuff I wanted to do. I would sit and watch, as Dave went through the process of cutting the rod to length, in order to get the action the buyer wanted, splining the blank, setting the seat location, and applying the grips. There wass a lot of cork back then, and cork tape was just coming in. Dave would then explain how to stress the rod to locate the stripper guide, and go over laying out the rest of the guides. The entire proces was to tune the rod to what the fisherman wanted to do with it. I still use those methods I learned from Dave, and completely disregard guide spacing charts that come with every blank.

I will continue to build this thread, along with some pictures, as time allows.

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Originally Posted by Stripercoast1

Charlie Murat was a cantankerous old cuss, weather worn and wrinkled from the blowing winds and pounding surf he felt at home in. You could buy any reel you wanted from him, as long as it was a Penn. .

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You could buy any reel you wanted from him, as long as it was a Penn. Yes those were the days when the name Penn meant someting! :rolleyes:

Great writing SC1, look forward to reading more. :thumbsup:

:thumbsup: Sounds like the beginning of an old salt sea tale for around the fire in the winter, nice.

Stripercoast1, Great story, thanks, I look forward to many more.

The biggest detail that needs to be understood, is that the technology of that period was no where near what it is today. To put it into perspective, you still had to rent your rotary phone from AT&T back then.
The blanks were thickly walled and heavy. The lighter of the 2 brands sold through Murats was the old Brown and original Lami's. Theses blanks offered more actions, and lengths, but were less popular in the lighter end of the models, because most guy's equated weight with strength and power. An attitude that is still pervasive with my personal choices. I don't own a salt water graphite rod. Not in surf anyway. I fish with guy's half my age that can't concieve of casting one of my old brownies with 3 ounce plugs all night.
The guy's that preferred the Harnells, for the most part, were the sand spikers. The longer blanks in the 12 foot range, could handle the really heavy stuff with relative ease. 8 ounces of lead and a whole herring or pogie, would reach the second bar with consistancy with a 705, or 6 hanging from the seat. From my memory, and experiance, you would have 3 or 4 Harnells soaking a bait in the spikes, and using a 10 or 11 foot Lami to throw metal lips while waiting for a pick up on one of the bait rods.
The lami's were also the preffered choice of the conventional casting guy's, with Penn squidders in the seat. The actions of these blanks allowed a more powerfull load up in order to reach a far off blitz with a 4 or 5 ounce pencil or polaris popper. The line of choice early on was either tarred cotton (the real old timers), or nylon squidding line. Mono was occaisionally used, but unless you were really familiar with it, birds nests would cause you to switch out the reel, in order to clean it out later. Most of the guy's I knew back then had smooth thumbs having burned their prints right off from thumbing the cast. I still use a 12 foot brownie with a Penn Squdder loaded with 65 lb Power Pro.
There were 2 choices of guides back then. Pacific Bay made, and still makes, a stainless ringed V braced surf guide, with chrome plating for wear resistance. Mildrum made both surf and casting guides, with Stainless frames and carbide rings. The carbide was 100 times more wear resistant, but way more expensive. Most guy's opted for the Pac Bays with a carbide tip from mildrum, as the tip took more of the line wear punishment than the rest of the guides. The prefered conventional built was all mildrum carbides. It was felt that the Mildrum was a strong frame, and the squidding line would wear through the entire run of guides more than the spinning set ups with mono.

More to come.

What a great story. You are a one of the lucky ones to learn while you were young. It is something that like you said becomes an art which you love. Can't wait for more details from a expert with timeless knowledge.

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Originally Posted by Stripercoast1

The biggest detail that needs to be understood, is that the technology of that period was no where near what it is today. To put it into perspective, you still had to rent your rotary phone from AT&T back then.

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A gentleman who remembers the rotary phones is someone I am comfortable with. Thank you for the great memories back in time, Striper.

Thanks for the kuddo's guy's, the knowledge was passed on to me, so as my old mentor told me, It's my duty to pass it on. If any of this drival helps even one person, I've accomplished something.
Back to the story.

The production process of the customs back then was of course based on the equipment. Actions tended to be stiffer, and the guides of the day were big. The length of the feet were up to 5 times what a modern guide is today. When you wrapped these guides onto the blank, they would then create a section where the blank was braced. In other words the action was deadened at that location. ( I promise pictures soon) Generally less guides were used overall, and it was uncommon to see a rod with more than 5 guides, 4 was the norm, and some bait heavers on the Cape used no more than 3. We're talking about 11 or 12 foot rods here. Shops put out what they called a canal special, a 10 foot rod with 4 guides, on a heavy action blank. Usually a 12 footer cut down 16 inches from the tip, and 8 from the butt. They were more like broom handles, than glass rods, as the folks that fished the canal then, weren't worried so much with casting distance as they were with beating a fish in a 10 to 15 knot current. Canal guy's usually spooled with a minimum of 30 lb test, the average used 40. Canal rods usually had more butt wrap as well to stiffen the portion of the rod just above the reel seat for even more lifting power.

With the advent of new materials, such as rings that resist wear, and 2 part epoxies, many of the issues with older rods are now almost exstinct. It was common for a custom rod to be rebuilt, accourding to how much seasonal use it got, every 2 years. Murats made their winter money doing axactly that. The old thread coatings, the most common being Gudebrod, would deteriorate after just a season or 2 of hard use, and guides would break at the welds, or groove from the line abrasion. It was a simple task to run a razor blade flat along the blank and strip out all the guides in less than 5 minutes. A light touch with 200 grit sand paper and the blank would look like it had never been wrapped. In a matter of an hour or less, the rod was re-guided and ready for use. New method building, takes at least 2 hours to accomplish just 1 broken guide to be replaced.

Pictures coming soon guy's, I'll try to get them up today. I have an old brownie still in its original built form that I am going to be stripping for a restoration re-build. It will clear up a lot of confusion anyone may have.

Picture time.

The old wire ringed guides, Mildrum braced were easily identified by the U shaped brace, while the Pac Bays have the V shaped bracing.
They both did an unbraced version that allowed a little bit more flexability to the rod. Although the weight differance added by the brace was virtually non existant, some guy's went that route thinking that it added weight to the rod.

Graphite reel seats were yet to be developed yet, and all seat were metal. They had 2 knurled rings to tighten the reel seat. Charlie felt that these rings should be at the top of the seat, in the down locking position, so that contact with the wrist during fishing wouldn't loosen them to allow the reel to fall out of the seat. It was a common source of disagreement between Dave and his Father in law. It helps me identify the age of a Murat rod when I find one at a yard sale or flea market. When Charlie passed on, Dave went to the up lock mounting position under the reel.

Changing the action of a blank by wrapping thread at the butt section above the forward grip was at one time nothing more than a run of thread covering the distance up the blank you wanted to stiffen. In a production situation, getting fancy wasn't a way to turn out a bunch of rods. Some butt wraps can take 18 hours.
My opinion is that life is way to short to fish an ugly rod. Heres a few butt wraps done for both looks and performance. The top 2 are single axis, or exist top and bottom of the rod, the lower one is double axis, with the diamonds existing on all 4 sides of the blank. Yeah, thats an Ugly Stick in the background of the 1st picture, it's the rod I loan out when I take a newb along.

So, who wants to re-build a rod?
Flea markets and yard sales are a couple of my greatest sources of blanks. The further away from the coast you get, the better the deals usually are. The common comments you get, This was my Dads, Grandfathers, uncles rod. I got it when I cleaned out his garage after he died. Whats it worth? My usual responce, It needs a lot of work, but I think I might be able to clean up that old GREEN reel, will you take $10.00 for it?
I will post pictures of the process of stripping down an old brownie, restoring the blank with epoxy, and re wrapping it with modern materials. The re wrap will also serve as a tutorial for the beginning rod builder as well.
It will have to wait a few days however, as the club will be hitting the canal starting tonight until Sunday. I'll get some sleep and continue this thread on monday.

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Originally Posted by Stripercoast1

So, who wants to re-build a rod?
Flea markets and yard sales are a couple of my greatest sources of blanks. ... My usual responce, It needs a lot of work, but I think I might be able to clean up that old GREEN reel, will you take $10.00 for it?
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Rod and old greenie for $10 :kooky: you drive a helluva bargain there, Gunny. :D

Good thread here, like the detailed stories. All you're missing is the guys sitting around in the bait shop smoking the cigars and pipes. :lookhappy:


Attachment 7003

As I type this story, Charlie in fact is puffing Black cherry through an old Mirshaum, with a golden retrievers head for the pipes bowl, Dave continues to light unfiltered Luckies from the stub of the previous one, thumb and finger stained dark brown. Butch is drawing off a Phillies blunt, before the days of restuffing, and filling the room with a cloud of smoke with every exhale. The smell of a Zippo lighter on the beach, especially during a cold front or winter duck blind still sends shivers up my spine as all those old memories come flooding back. Can't forget the blue enamled coffee pot forever perking on an old coleman stove either. Then there's the canned bacon, the kind with the congield fat, dumped into the cast iron frying pan, then the eggs cooked in said fat on the tailgate of a pick up truck.

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Originally Posted by Stripercoast1

As I type this story, Charlie in fact is puffing Black cherry through an old Mirshaum, with a golden retrievers head for the pipes bowl, Dave continues to light unfiltered Luckies from the stub of the previous one, thumb and finger stained dark brown. Butch is drawing off a Phillies blunt, before the days of restuffing, and filling the room with a cloud of smoke with every exhale. The smell of a Zippo lighter on the beach, especially during a cold front or winter duck blind still sends shivers up my spine as all those old memories come flooding back. Can't forget the blue enamled coffee pot forever perking on an old coleman stove either. Then there's the canned bacon, the kind with the congield fat, dumped into the cast iron frying pan, then the eggs cooked in said fat on the tailgate of a pick up truck.

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Eggs cooked on the tailgate of a pickup truck thats an awesome read I can smell the bacon sizzling after reading that. Thanks for sharing and for the history tutorial as well. Keep em coming!