HOLDING A MIRROR UP TO HOW WE ALL ONCE FISHED
As a confirmed bookworm, Dom Garnett enjoys finding relics from the history of angling. But what can they tell us about how our ancestors went about catching when tackle was, to put it crudely... crude? W
HEN all your friends and family know you’re mad about fishing you can expect the odd ‘bonus’ item to come your way.
A fair number of these attic and garage finds turn out to be trash rather than treasure, but every so often you unearth a gem.
It is the books that fascinate me the most. They provoke different reactions, from laughter at how crude tackle once was to amazement at how resourceful previous generations were. The best are like looking through a window into a lost world.
Last week, family friend and old-school London angler Vince Skinner passed me a real jewel – ‘Mirror of Angling Volume II’. Printed in 1938, it’s a haunting thought that while Hitler was planning to invade half of Europe, the menfolk of Yorkshire and Kent were pondering how to make floats out of drinking straws or natty little boxes for storing flies and spinners.
Crammed into this little volume are the best tips and nuggets of wisdom that Mirror readers of the day were prepared to share. And what a collection of odds and ends it is, too! The advice ranges from timeless and ingenious ideas, to plans you’re not sure even the A Team could have pulled off.
Particularly eye-opening is the sheer initiative and practical knowhow our ancestors had. No off-the-shelf rod rests or holdalls for these chaps, who are all credited rather formally via initials and surnames only. While the gear itself is dated, the craft and effort involved are spellbinding.
Under subheadings such as ‘weather lore’, ‘preserving elderberries’ and ‘staining gut’ we have a wealth of shared knowledge from the generation who made their own landing nets and turned their own maggots.
In the Queen’s English of the time, of course, the latter are rather effetely referred to as ‘gentles’, as if the m-word denoted some unspeakable form of evil.
Standards in fish conservation are also particularly interesting and, to me at least, put some contemporary angling moans into perspective. In 1938, the record tench is a mere 7lb... meanwhile, progressive anglers are advised to join the growing trend of releasing fish and only whacking the likes of 2lb-plus roach on the head for the glass case in the study. My favourite instruction of all, though, is the advice on ‘making
an eel lie still’, using a copy of the Daily Mirror, naturally.
We can chuckle today, but such volumes remind us how much – or how little – angling has changed.
Nor can I mock too loudly, because even as an angler born in 1979, my fishing began in an age of fibreglass rods and swingtips, when tackle shops stank of fags and ammonia. How will future generations look upon today’s habits in the year 2050, I wonder…