“Can you pull in the leviathan with a fishhook?” -Job 41:1
“And as a fisher on a jutting rock, when he casts in his baits as a snare to the little
fishes, with his long pole lets down into the sea the horn of an ox of the steading.”
-Homer, Odyssey
Fishing. It’s in the Old Testament and the writings of ancient Greeks. Egyptian
hieroglyphs depict it. We’re just the latest in a long line of rod-wielders. Hooks, lines,
and sinkers are nothing new. The first fishing poles were cut from sugar cane and
bamboo. Once ubiquitous ’gouge’ hooks were simply pieces of bone sharpened on
both ends. In fact, the oldest known fishing hooks, discovered in a southeast Asian
cave, date back to 40,000 BC!
For millennia, fishing remained functional, but stagnant. Further innovations started
much more recently than you might think. The first steel hooks didn’t come until 1813
—out of Connecticut of all places. The first winding reel appeared later that same
century—Milwaukee, Wisconsin, 1878. The progress only accelerated from there. In
1887, we got the first steel rod and in 1896, the first silk fishing line company. (Both
these innovations again came from…Connecticut!)
Necessity is indeed the mother of invention. (Side note: that adage dates back to
another Greek, this time a philosopher, Plato.) For most of civilization, that necessity
was food. Fishing was a means to an end—a way to feed your family. That all changed
with George Perry in 1932. His 22.5 pound largemouth bass remained a world record
for 77 years and, more importantly, sparked a worldwide interest in fishing as a sport.
From there, it was competition, not hunger, that fueled innovation.
MODERN RODS
Fiberglass rods became de rigueur in the mid-20th century. Graphite, a significantly
lighter option, followed, only to be trumped by carbon fiber (a graphite derivative) that
enhanced weight and strength. Today, nano-technology (creating materials at the
molecular level) allows for rod innovation far beyond anything George Perry could have
dreamed.
MODERN LURES
For any fishing historian, or lure aficionado, Lauri Rapala is a household name. He is,
without question, the godfather of the modern lure. His idea? Create a lure that
mimicked the movements of fishes’ natural prey—other, smaller fish. In 1936, with cork
and chocolate bar tinfoil, he did just that! By the 1960s, production grew and a 1962
Life magazine article made his namesake lures a widely-available sensation. The
Rapala lure company continues to thrive today.
Since the 1970s, the Evolution Charters team has been fishing the waters of Lake
Michigan. In our fifty-plus years of experience, we’ve seen the innovation first hand!
Book a charter fishing trip with us for a timeless tradition proudly brought into the 21st
century.
Source: http://www.fishingmuseum.org.uk; http://www.sciencemag.org; https://
bassforecast.com; https://igfa.org/; https://lecomptoirgeneral.com
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