Here’s an interesting newspaper article I ran across recently. It’s from the Chicago Tribune, Sunday, May 8, 1949 and was written by the Tribune’s sports editor, Bob Becker. I found it interesting because of the subject – recommended books for anglers, 1949 – and for Bob Becker, who’s background I researched a little bit. According to Becker, these were the hot fishing books of the year, and a few of them will no doubt be recognized by readers of this website.
Becker writes, “If the 1949 fisherman doesn’t have more fun with his equipment and can’t improve his catch per hour, per cast, he can’t blame the angling experts because the latter have been mighty busy with their typewriters telling how to fool every kind of a finny scrapper from panfish to salmon. In fact, the modern angler who sallies forth with his equipment today should be able to give any fish an inferiority complex by virtue of the amount of sound reading he can do before visiting lake or stream.”
He then lists 15 recently published tomes, kicking the list off with none other than Jason Lucas’s Lucas on Bass Fishing. Becker points out that this is the new, revised edition of Lucas’ ground-breaking volume. “More than 100 new pages of discussion about spinning and spinning lures for bass…” As the fishing Editor for Sports Afield for two decades, Lucas was a well established authority, and his book cemented him as the foremost bass fishing authority of the mid-20th century. You could hardly have a better, more influential book to lead a list of books for anglers, 1949.
Since BFA is a bass-centric website we’ll skip any of the books that don’t have anything to do with bass, including the next one by Bert Claflin, titled Muskie Fishing. I mention this one because I live in a muskie state and have a special fondness for the big fish, but mainly because I’m shocked at how much this book sells for today. I thought of picking up a copy, but costing anywhere from $60 at the low end, up to $250, I think I might have to wait until I win the lottery.
Anyway, Robert Page Lincoln is the next author. At the time of Becker’s column, Lincoln was three years away from writing his classic Black Bass Fishing, Theory & Practice (1952). Terry Battisti wrote an excellent 3-part review of Lincoln’s bass book – part 3 here, which has links for parts 1 and 2 – which I strongly encourage everyone to read or reread. The book Becker cites is Lincoln’s Guide to Best Fishing, a book I have and that is really a fisherman’s travelogue of hot spots in America.
Spinning For American Game Fish by Joseph D. Bates Jr. is a handsome book that comes next. The dust jacket looks amazing and the embossed illustration on the book cover itself is beautiful. I’ve ordered this one and am anxious to dive into it. Becker indicates that the retail cost of the book, in 1949, was $4. I checked a few sources online and it generally goes for $10 to $20 today (I paid $10, with shipping). He tells readers that the book “is a must. It’s the first book on spinning to be published in this country and has scores of suggestions on how to use spinning equipment.”
Two entries later we come to another brilliant bass fishing volume, John Alden Knight’s Black Bass. Knight wrote several books on fishing, including one on solunar tables, as well as at least two on upland game birds (woodcock and ruffed grouse). Becker spends more words than any other entry on Knight’s work, stating, “This is a new book by Mr. Knight, the studious eastern angler, reflects the author’s research in the sport of bass fishing. The characteristics, life cycle, behavior and food habits of both the largemouth and smallmouth bass are discussed in Mr. Knight’s usual brisk style. The chapters on fly and bait casting tackle that the fisherman will need for bass fishing in lakes or rivers offer many helpful hints on equipment and how to use it. This book will be of special interest to fishermen who like to catch bass in rivers.” Black Bass was republished in 2014 by Skyhorse Publishing.
The next book is one I ordered before finding Becker’s article, but which in fact led me to this column. It’s by Ernest Liotta Jr. and is called The Techniques of Bait Casting. It’s a short, somewhat hard to find book by the youngest man, at age 20, to win the National All-Around Bait and Fly Casting Championship. Liotta won at least 40 other casting competitions. I got interested in Liotta when I picked up four funky dardevle-like spoons with an engraved name I’d never heard of: Liotta Jr. That sent me on a path to discover who Liotta was and, ultimately, to buying his book for review on BFA. So, I won’t say anything more about Liotta, but will wait until I review the book to spill the beans on this interesting fellow. But I am excited to find Liotta’s bait casting book among Becker’s books for anglers, 1949.
A couple books on fly casting and trout come next, then Becker lists a book that, while not about bass specifically, he gives a heckuva sales pitch for. It’s called The Ways of Fishes by Leonard P. Schultz and Edith M. Stern. “The most fascinating contribution to the literature of marine life that we’ve read in many a year. Some of the facts about the unusual fishes of the world, fantastic methods to get their food, and how they live, are so bizarre that the book often reads like fiction. Nicely illustrated. The kind of a fish book that a fisherman doesn’t want to loan to his friend.” Well, shoot, I’m sold! I immediately found a copy for under $10, with shipping, and ordered it.
Next up is Bait Casting With A Thermometer by Frank Steel. Steel is the creator of the Wigglefrog, a pretty realistic-looking frog that came in a screw top plastic tube. Terry wrote a little about the Wigglefrog back on June 11, 2023. He said that he also ordered Bait Casting With A Thermometer and would share his review of the book on BFA. I’m eager to read Terry’s review, but if I have to wait that’s ok, because I ordered the book too!
A couple of cookbooks and a work on fishing in Canada follow, before we get to the final entry on Becker’s list, another one by Frank R. Steel, editor. Fishing Tackle Digest is a great book for lovers of vintage lures and tackle. The edition that Becker refers to in his column is the second. I believe the digest was updated for some time.
Thus, Bob Becker’s books for anglers, 1949, has at least three of the most influential bass fishing authors of the age: Lucas, Lincoln and Knight. It was a good year for fishing books.
Briefly about Bob Becker: Becker was the outdoors editor for the Chicago Tribune from 1921 to 1956, when he relinquished his post to Tom McNally, a name that should be familiar to a lot of anglers, hunters and outdoors folk. Becker was born in 1890 in South Dakota, before his family moved to Beloit, Wisconsin. He studied science, languages, and archeology at Beloit College and graduated in 1912. After a study of Indian Mounds in Wisconsin, the paper of which he considered his first professional writing, he hired on to the Chicago Field Museum. The museum sent him on a year-and-a-half-long expedition to South America, where he sharpened the outdoors skills he would later write about for the Chicago Tribune. He later returned to South America on another expedition, and packed through the western United States as well. He also did a stint in the Navy during World War I. In 1932 Becker had a species of bat named after him, a species he discovered while on expedition in the Amazon.
He traveled the world and some remote places in America, became an expert on hunting dogs, fishing, and the outdoors life. He took the job with the Tribune in 1921 as a temporary fill-in position until they could find someone permanent. What began as a temporary position lasted for 35 years. In addition to his work with the newspaper, he was a radio personality in Chicago for 15 years. In his “Woods and Waters” column Becker wrote about fishing in the Midwest where he lived, in the United States at large and around the world. For 35 years his pen was one that spoke to anglers and outdoors-people on a weekly basis, a job that I think sometimes gets lost as we look at and review the big literary works. Although Becker did write an angling book titled Which Lures and Where, published in 1938 by the Chicago Tribune. After I learned a bit about Bob Becker and his contribution to the outdoor life, I thought it would be appropriate to tip the hat to him.
