I examine the 1939 Penn Reels catalogue in which the Penn Squidder 140 Tournament Casting and Surf Fishing reel was introduced, perhaps the best and most successful reel design in history, based upon the original reel designed by Penn, the 60 Long Beach, which is the evolution of the originl Penn K reel.
These two reels represent the finest in traditional reel design, a perfection which has never been exceeded yet often copied.
Otto Henze, immigrated to the United States from Germany in 1922. At 25, he worked as a machinist for the reel manufacturer Ocean City Manufacturing Company of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. In 1932, Henze rented a 3rd floor loft on 492 North Third Street in Philadelphia from a general machinist firm, William Schmitz & Company. There he completed his first two reel designs, the Models F and K, which by 1938 had evolved into the Penn Squidder 140 and Penn Long Beach 60 respectively.
This video examines the catalogue as well as two nice examples of the evolved reels as they can be found for sale on Ebay today, 2021.
These Penn reels have stood the test of time better than any other brand of fishing reel period. They found design perfection and kept it forever. The modern reels are only different, not better, than these original designs. Both designs were still manufactured and sold in 1999. If these designs were built to the tolerances possible with modern machinery, they would surpass all modern day efforts.
Perhaps these reels were removed from the market intentionally, for In 2003, the Penn Fishing Reels Company was acquired by rival tackle companies Sea Striker Inc. and Master Fishing Tackle. It was acquired in 2007 by K2 Sports. Jarden acquired K2 Sports and added Penn Reels to its Pure Fishing portfolio of fishing tackle manufacturers and marketing companies. Newell Brands took control of Pure Fishing when it acquired the Jarden Corporation in April 2016. In January 2019, Penn Reels, together with associated companies forming Pure Fishing, was sold by Newell Brands to Sycamore Partners for $1.3 billion.
So the modern reels loose all character that these ones had and pander to a fashion which is self-created by the companies and brands themselves. In the corporate internationalisation, something has been lost that I hope can be appreciated here.
Even pennreels.com no longer exists and is blatant proof of the disinterest in history and miss-management of companies which, like cattle, are now only "branded" and kept solely for their "meat" value.
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