Rhodes Mechanical Frog
The Rhodes Mechanical Frog lure in the correct wooden box combines 2 different things that antique lure collectors get excited about. First off, a wood box lure, who doesn’t like just the sound of that. This antique lure box shows the printed images clearly, and shows the patent date of October 31, 1905 and a second date of July 3rd, 1906 on the end label of the box. It also give you a glimpse in the world of a 100 or century old lure marketing and cataloging with a No. 3 GWF model.
On the front on the wood box it exclaims; Always Alive, Always Kicking, Never Tires Never Dies.
Secondly in the Combos a great antique frog lure. The Shakespeare Rhodes frog is a early 1900’s rubber frog antique lure that when the line tie is pulled the legs kick. For every good one out there there’s 10 that the legs are broke and unfortunately that’s just the nature of early rubber and fishing lures, time is not on their side. The lure itself dates to around 1909 or before. Shakespeare purchased the rights to this lure from Rhodes. The lure is 3 1/4 inches and can also be found in a cardboard gray picture box. The lure has a weighted abdomen, one forward double hook, and two rear single hooks attached via a wire through construction on each side of the legs.
Here’s an neat read, and incredibly old article from 1906 describing what they deem interesting new lures . I apologize, as its hard to read due to the quality of the paper and scan and trying to blow it up to make it readable. But it says:
“The Rhodes Mechanical Frog in wonderful imitation of the real frog with legs that draw up to the body when the frog is at rest, and which spring out to full length as the frog is drawn through the water, is another of this season’s novelties. Nothing better in the way of imitation of natural motion of any lure used in fishing has so far come on the market and it is safe to say that this lure will do great execution during the coming season.“
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