vintage fishing lures

After entering Mike Hilchey’s town of Elba home, the first thing that caught my eye was the number of fishing rods lining the wall. Turning to hand him my jacket, I saw the glass covered display cases full of vintage spoons and spinners. And that’s just inside the entranceway.   

As Mike leads Claudia and me through a narrow hall, we see a few paintings on the wall, mostly waterfowl, including one signature Roy Mason watercolor. Entering the den was like stepping back in time five, six, seven decades and more. Here was the treasure trove of vintage fishing lures: hand-carved wooden lures with glass eyes, bronze spinners, deer hair frogs & mice for the fly-fishermen, even a tiny Redeye Wiggler made for the fly-rod. And that barely scratches the surface of his collection.  

There are boxes bearing the names of Heddon, Creek-Chub, Eppinger, Arbogast and others, all synonymous with noted fish catchers of the mid-20th century.  Others are dated even further back in time, bearing the names of South Bend, Pleuger, Chapman, and the Paw-Paw Bait Co. There is also a collection of Buell spinners from the late 1800’s.

Mike was born and raised locally. The Hilchey homestead was on Trumbull Parkway, but his dad, the late Weldon Hilchey made his living in rural Genesee County. “Dad had a welding shop in Elba and he knew all the local farmers. Any that had farm ponds we had access to,” Mike stated. As a result, Mike began wetting a line with his dad early in his formative years, decades before Take a Kid Fishing became a slogan.   

Fishing was hot in those years for the father and son, and there were days when it seemed like the bass were just waiting for the lure to hit the water. “Some days we’d catch a fish on almost every cast.” he said. There were also yearly family trips to Canada, up beyond North Bay, Ontario. “Me, mom, dad and my sister all fished. We fished for everything, pike, bass and walleye.” 

Having listened to Mike Hilchey’s accounts of fishing trips to local farm ponds with his dad, of family outings to Canadian waters, its no wonder he’s taken to collecting vintage lures. Then I asked how long he’s been at it.

“Roughly I’ve been collecting for 28 to 30 years” he said. “I got started before many people got into it. At that time I could go to flea markets and garage sales and buy a whole tackle box full of lures for as little as $20 or $25.”       

Today many of Mike Hilchey’s mint condition lures are listed anywhere from $100 to $150 apiece. Some, like the Heddon Spin Diver, command an even higher price. “You can’t get one for under $500”, he said. Still, the Spin Diver’s price tag is not the costliest among his collection. When Claudia asked if he had come across any really unusual or unique stuff, he replied, “I’ve had my share of good finds – sold some, traded others” he said. One of his most valued is the Shakespeare Rhodes Minnow, pictured below. For vintage lure collectors, a mint condition “Rhodes” is considered a rarity and will command a price in the thousands!

His passion for collecting vintage fishing lures hasn’t put a damper on Mike’s angling enthusiasm. For the most part his days of farm pond angling are a thing of the past and he now spends much of his time on the bass tournament circuit. Now retired, Mike Hilchey puts his boat in the water sometime after ice-out, fishing every chance he gets until November 30, the day bass season closes. 

 Below are a few more photos from Mike's yesteryear collection

An unusual splatter-finish

A 1942 South Bend fishing catalog

There’s a good story behind many of the lures in my old tackle box. Such is the case with the wobbling spoon pictured above. Called a Red-eyed Wiggler, it was at one time manufactured by the Hofschneider Tackle Co. in Rochester, N.Y. I was twelve years old on the day I made a mental note to purchase one. And I doubt I ever clipped it to my line without thinking of two former Batavians who, back in the day, were virtually inseparable. You see, they were the reason I went out and bought a “wiggler”. Before I tell you about them, I first need to fast forward a few years.

I was an up and coming northern pike fisherman on the day I walked into Barrett’s Batavia Marine to see the late Paul Levins. I wanted Paul to show me how to make a slip-bobber rig for catching northerns. I was strolling between used gun rack and the counter when I heard Paul’s voice from the back of the store.  “That’s a nice pike,” he said.

It was a nice pike, big as any I’d seen up to that time. Having seen the fish, I walked right into the mix, immediately asking “Where’d ya catch it?” The proud angler was from the east end of town, I had seen him around, but didn’t know him personally. “Under the Jackson Street Bridge,” he replied.  It wasn’t long before I learned the pike in question wasn’t caught at said locale. As is common practice among anglers, I don’t blame him for trying to keep his hotspot a secret.

What’s more, at the time the fibber’s account made perfect sense to me. The reason being, it had only been a few years earlier that I was standing atop the old Lehigh Railroad Bridge – which was adjacent the South Jackson St. Bridge - when I saw a rowboat passing below. In it were the aforementioned pals who grew up on Batavia’s southside. Pat Pullinzi was doing the rowing while Mike Lovria tended to his fishing gear.

Pat Pullinzi

And as I stated previously, from their earliest years together, through St. Anthony’s School and all through their BHS years, Mike Lovria and Pat Pullinzi were inseparable. Whether they were fishing the Tonawanda, hunting upland game (pheasants were plentiful in those years) and chasing rabbits behind the late Mike Lovria Sr’s, beagle, the duo were practically joined at the hip.

It was a late spring afternoon when Lovria and Pullinzi passed below the bridge in a rowboat.  From my vantage point I could see a minnow bucket on the floor of the boat, probably full of chubs. In the bow were fishing rods, one of which had a Red-eyed Wiggler attached to the line. Word had it that, Earlier that day, one of the two – I’m not sure which – hooked and lost a big northern pike somewhere in the vicinity of Whiskey Run. When I saw the pair heading upstream they were returning in an attempt to relocate the big fish.  

Mike Lovria

In those years, being at such an impressionable age and desiring more than anything to catch a big pike,  the mental image of a young Mike Lovria and Pat Pullinzi rowing upstream in pursuit of a big northern was etched into my back pages. And it was only days afterward that a Red-eyed Wiggler occupied a compartment in my tackle box.  Forty-eight years later it's still there.