Old Round Bamboo (Wood?) Fly Rod Identification

[shadrich]

I have been lurking on this forum for the past few weeks in the interest of buying or building a fishable bamboo rod for Western Washington streams. It made me recall several bamboo rods that were in my Grandmother's garage as a child. The rods belonged to my Grandfather and/or Great-Grandfather. My brother now has them in his garage.

I've identified two of the fairly complete rods as a Shakespeare 1311-B 9-1/2ft (1926-28'ish) and a South Bend 57-9' with a walnut grip.

Is the Shakespeare worth refurbishing and fishing? From what I gather, the South Bend 57 is not all that great.

The last rod is round rather than hexagonal, and I suspect it may be older than the Shakespeare. The middle section is missing, and the rod is in rough shape. I am mostly curious as to whether anyone knows what it is, since I do not see any identifiable markings. Pictures of the sections are below. Please let me know if additional pictures or information will help.

Thanks in advance!
Shad

[TheMontyMan]

Shad, your round rod was made by the Montague City Rod Company and appears to be made of rounded 6 strip bamboo.

Montague offered a handful of models that were made with rounded split bamboo thru the 20's and into the early 30's. Yours was probably built in the mid to late 1920's, based on the hardware.

This rod would only be worth refurbishing if you wanted it to do it for sentimental reasons, and/or to fish with it in honor of your Grandfather, assuming these were his personal fishing rods.

. . . Rex
The Monty Man

[shadrich]

Hi, Rex. Thanks so much for taking the time to respond. It might be time to let the Montague rod sections go, since they have been kicking around in various garages for at least the past 50 years. At least now we know.