Vintage J. C. Higgins (made by Martin) automatic fly fishing reel with graphic

Description

Offered for auction:
Vintage J. C. Higgins (made for Sears by Martin Automatic Fish Reel Co.)
automatic fishing reel with applied trout graphic and presentation box.
The reel's patent was issued in 1939, so the reel was made 1939-1942.
This reel has a larger spool than the older  #1 and #2 Martins and there is plenty of room on the spool for longer modern double-tapered fly lines. The reel has the newly-designed pawl spool brake, instead of the leather pads used on all  older Martins. The reel is intended for trout, bass and general freshwater fishing. If you fish with vintage fly line and, perhaps, a bamboo rod, the reel's spool will hold about 90' of “G” line. If you use modern fly line, the spool will hold about 70' of commonly available floating line. It weighs 8.2 ounces, the same as a Martin Fly-Wate auto reel (#37/38 and #47/48). The reel appears to be identical to a #38 Fly-Wate Martin with the same 1939 patent (# 2.175.756).
This reel has been disassembled, cleaned, given a two-tone paint job nearly identical to the original one, and it has an applied trout graphic secured with several coats of clear-coat lacquer. The reel is in excellent operating condition and works as smoothly as silk. It has been lightly lubricated with waterproof bicycle bearing grease, reassembled and adjusted. Included is a presentation box made from a cigar box (see the last two pictures).
This is a one-of-a-kind reel that should serve you well for many years - buy it with confidence. If you are a reel collector, it will certainly liven up your reel shelves!
There is a rewind-spring-release lever on the spring disk that free-spools the line, so, if you like to play a fish with a pile of line accumulating at your feet or streaming downstream from you in the river, you may. Of course, automatic reels were developed by Martin and other companies in the late 1800s to avoid just this problem. If one plays the fish while holding up the spool-rewind lever, any slack line is immediately taken back onto the spool.
Martin reels are way over-built and, if you clean and lubricate it once in a while, this reel will probably last another 75 years. The newly designed pawl spool brake holds well, even when the rewind spring has been wound up tightly. Martin rewind springs cannot be over-wound by a big fish on a long run because all Martin reels have an automatic spring-tension release mechanism built into the line spool. As with any automatic reel, one CAN break the reel's rewind spring by over-winding it by hand or by letting the spool rewind way too fast as the end of the line returns to the reel or by rewinding way too fast with an empty spool.
This reel would make an excellent Christmas gift for family or friends who fly-fish.
More of my decorated Martin and other automatic reels may be seen here:
https://www.ebay.com/sch/holl-1832/m.html