Wednesday, April 22, 2015

Things with a history in our dining room

Our dining room at camp is a treasure trove of fishing and hunting history. Take the photo above. That old chair is actually a relic of the 1926 Red Lake Gold Rush. It is made of planed lumber and held together with clinched nails.
Sitting on the chair is a hand-carved mallard decoy that came to us from my great-Uncle Bill's camp -- Rainbow Lodge on Pickerel River. It and other old decoys on display would have been used in the 1920s and '30s in the Georgian Bay area.
Finally, the three grey boxes are our shore lunch boxes that we give to guests when they cook their fish for lunch out on the rocks. They are packed fresh each time with all the ingredients and utensils needed for the feast. They might seem new by comparison but are actually over 50 years old. This is our 54th year of operation.
Not pictured but hung on all the walls are old steel fishing rods and fishing reels that we all used at one time. There are some real relics including a Zebco that has a rotary dial where the thumb push-button is these days. This reel doesn't have a drag. You played the fish by putting pressure against the rotary dial which I would guess is made of Bakelite. To cast the reel there was a tiny push button on the top that engaged a free-spool. You held pressure on the rotary dial with your thumb until your rod was in the right position, then released the dial. It was sort of like using a baitcaster.
I've never seen another like it and would be interested in knowing when it was made. Anybody know? Unfortunately I don't have a photo handy.
Click to go back to our website
 Click to see the latest on the blog

No comments: