Show Off Your Long Beach

[Penn Chronology]

A photo of the people at Penn who made the early reels that we all collect

Superhook aka Ray,

Great Photo of the Penn plant. That picture is taken when the plant was relatively new, in the late 1940's. It has changed a bit but the structure is still located 3028 Hunting Park Ave., Philadelphia and is still operating. Penn moved into the plant during WW II and is still in the same building making some of their high end International reels. Many of today's businesses can not say that. I give credit to David Martin, former Penn CEO. He fought to keep a part of Penn manufacturing here in the USA after the liquidation of the company by the Henze family.

I also had a very old Long Beach without any number designation on it, but it was the size of a 65.  Ugliest reel I ever owned, and almost all of the chrome had been eaten away, but it had the longest freespool of any reel I've ever owned.  I sold it on a whim.

Funny but many of the old reels get really ugly but still fish great.

My first cool find was a 1933 Long Beach 65. I nicknamed it my, ""Ugly Long Beach"". I will never part with that reel because it was my initiation into reel collecting. Anyone that decides he wants to make a collection of early vintage Penn reels will always strive to get the 1933 models because they are the first models and they are also different than all the other Penn reels that came after them. So, when I found my first 1933 Long Beach, it was filthy, covered in over spray, loaded with old dried up linen line that was so heavy it looked like rope rather than fishing line and a good amount of the chrome was gone. I restored that reel to the best I could get it and still have it. If I decide to sell my collection, this reel will never be part of the sale. They say you can't take it with you, I don't care what they say, this one is going with me..................! Probably because no one else would ever want it..................................


My 1933 ugly Long Beach before

My 1933 ugly Long Beach after. Still ugly but special to me...........................

[Superhook]

George,

The #259 has "Long Beach" on the tail plate . A strong reel with double rings .

Shark Hunter,
over 100 people in the photo . Unbelievable for reel manufacturing....compared to today.  There are plenty of windows in the 3 level building

Ray

[Superhook]

Mike,

Looks are secondary even though it raises the value. The important thing is for all the parts to be original.

I won't part with an ugly Penn/Schultz Jones Beach reel that you picked up and tidied up for me.

Ray

[Alto Mare]

Here is a Long Beach from Ted (Max Doubt):
I'll let Ted fill in the details, or maybe Mike could shed some light on this one.

[Superhook]

Ted/Sal

Mikes hit the sack.  That's a rare red coloured Long Beach . The tail plate with the graphics and waffle clicker and drilled spool is 1938 . The torpedo handle is 1939.

Rare colour find and the 150 yards size is not common. I would have given you a bit more competition but i got caught up with some urgent work and missed the end. Glad it went to a good home.

Ray

[Maxed Out]

That is a great pic of the penn factory. I notice a lot of women in the pic, which says a lot about the era of the pic (just after WWII).

Ray, I fully expected you to end up with the colored LB. My collection is not worthy of it in comparison to yours or Michaels collection of non-typical penn reels. Please keep sharing your pics and knowledge of penn history. It gives me a reason to get on my computer every day to see what you 2 guys are up to. lol

[Maxed Out]

Ted/Sal

Mikes hit the sack.  That's a rare red coloured Long Beach . The tail plate with the graphics and waffle clicker and drilled spool is 1938 . The torpedo handle is 1939.

Rare colour find and the 150 yards size is not common. I would have given you a bit more competition but i got caught up with some urgent work and missed the end. Glad it went to a good home.

Ray

Your description of the maroon LB is correct Ray...just like you had it sitting in front of you on your workbench

The LB 61 I recently won(thanks for letting me win Ray) has hershery clicker and same type handle and a post on the spool, which I believe represents the last year of production for the 3 smaller yardage LB reels. Now I just gotta get my hands on a LB 63 to complete the set of small yardage LB. It never hurt to dream !! I also just recently stumbled on to a mid 40's LB 60 in mint condition, not that uncommon, but this one is a lefty, which is a very difficult find indeed !!

[George4741]

George,
The #259 has "Long Beach" on the tail plate . A strong reel with double rings .
Ray

Yup.

After seeing photos of the "Ugly Long Beach" and others, I wished I'd kept my old ugly "65" size Long Beach.

[Penn Chronology]

The LB 61 I recently won(thanks for letting me win Ray) has hershery clicker and same type handle and a post on the spool, which I believe represents the last year of production for the 3 smaller yardage LB reels. Now I just gotta get my hands on a LB 63 to complete the set of small yardage LB. It never hurt to dream !! I also just recently stumbled on to a mid 40's LB 60 in mint condition, not that uncommon, but this one is a lefty, which is a very difficult find indeed !!

Ted,

I saw you win the Long Beach 100 yard model.That was a very good find for you. You have had a good week for collector reels. Between the Red Model 62 and the Model 61, I know you must be feeling lucky. They are both tough reels to find. So, I am watching you, if anyone can find a Model 63, it will be you. The Model 63 was only made in 1938 and 1939 and it did not sell well at all, so that is a very tough reel to come across, especially because it looks like any other Long Beach and would normally go unnoticed when mixed in with a bunch of reels.

Concerning the Red Model 62, you may want to look on the back side of the handle blade and the backside of the free spool lever to see if there are any out of the ordinary stamped numbers. Sometimes Penn would stamp batch numbers on these special order reels (see Superhook's Green Sea Ford, earlier in this thread).

After seeing photos of the "Ugly Long Beach" and others, I wished I'd kept my old ugly "65" size Long Beach. Sad

George,

You should never second guess yourself. There are dozens of reels I am sorry I sold and probably more than that many reels I feel I should have bought. In the moment, you can never really know what the right thing to do is unless the deal is so good you cannot refuse it. My most favorite word, when it comes to deals I miss or let go is, "NEXT!" There is always another deal around the corner.

[Superhook]

Ted,

The 100 yd Long Beach you have is a hard one to find and is in good condition (Bonus) . I do have one so i was only trying to steal it. Glad it went to a good home.  The 200 yards model is another tough find with the small diameter plates of the 100 & 150 yards size . You may need to see the 200 yards stamp on the foot to recognize one. I will stay off it if one appears . Yes , greedy guts has one.

Ray

[Vintage Offshore Tackle]

I would really appreciate it if someone would please tell me what the black diamond on the left side plate of this reel means, and what size this reel is.  It's a small diameter (3") old Long Beach with a frame width of 1 5/8".  There are no markings on any of the metal parts.  I'm assuming that the diamond means that this is a trade reel, since I also have an old Ocean City with the same mark, but I don't remember seeing anything about this particular mark in Mike's book.

Thanks,

Randy

[Alto Mare]

Randy is that painted on  or is it molded into the plate as an inlay?

[Vintage Offshore Tackle]

It looks like an inlay Sal, but I can't say for sure.

[Superhook]

Randy,

That's a very good 35 Long Beach #60 . Mike told me the white diamond denotes it was made for the 'New York Hardware Trading Company' . The white diamond is on other manufacturers reels made for NYHTC .

Ray

[Vintage Offshore Tackle]

Thanks for the info Ray.  I really appreciate it.