I have a photo of the rod that caught the record off whitby somewhere, I think its on and old phone but not a bad picture.
The rod is now owned by Sam Harris, who seems to have disapeared off forums, but he does occasionally hold talks for angling clubs and it was at one of these I met him and got the photo's of the rod and reel. I will contact him and see if he minds if I post the pics on here. (assuming I have not lost they in my xmashard drive crash)
If you ever get an opportunity to go to one of his talks grab it because it is a good night out...and free from what I remember.
The rod/ reel line/trace and hook setup are the originals used to land the record tunny...and what an awesome et of gear it is.
The rod is about 7'6" and constructed similar to a split can fly rod but the segments are laid over a steel core. The wood is a material called "lance wood" and each segment is only held in place by the whippings on the rings, no glue is used. This allows the segments to slide against one another when the rod is under load. In terms of weight I carried thing thing back to Sams car after the talk and would not like to think I had to hold it to battle a fish for any length of time.
The reel is a hardy multiplier the likes and size of which I had never seen. the diameter was far in excess of a pint glass. The line was an Irish hemp ( I think) which looked very similar to modern braid. The wire trcae and hook were exactly what you would expect...very heavy and about 20 feet long, the unusual thing was that the join between the line and the trace was a whipped section of leather.
This was supposed to act as a shock absorber between the trace and the line as allegedly it would strech from its original few inches long to several feet. To be perfectly honest it looked like a serious weak link to me.
Will Tunny ever return?...In theory they would if the herring returned to there glory days in terms of numbers, as these are what the tunny were chasing. But the pressure on both the tunny and the herring make it very unlikely IMHO. They do catch them off the west coast ofscotand and Ireland...maybe oneday one will turn up at Blyth like the swordfish did...and it will put up a hell of a fight on a set of daylights.
Cheers
Dave.
PS I dont have discovery ..anyone got a DVD recorder
