The Cap'n Bills went through several iterations. The Shearer Bros. of Northbridge/Whitinsville MA. were the first builders and developers of that line of plugs. They were sold to Red Top bait eventually and Bunny DePietro had a guy in New Hampshire turn the bodies, paint and coat them with a heavy epoxy finish ( to make up for the lack of sealer I guess) Early versions are not "cheap pine" as was previously stated, but red western cedar, as with anything that gets "farmed out" by one person to another to keep up with demand, the guy in N.H. was found to be "cheapening" the process by switching to un-seasoned pine which led to later models splitting and cracking. The guy in N.H. would ship down cardboard barrels of of finished but un-riggerd plugs to Red Top and Bunny had Chester "Biff" McArdle ( later of Biff's Bait and Tackle by the Sagamore Bridge) cut the lip slots and thru wire and lip them then put on the hooks and box them.
Stan Gibbs trolling swimmers are still made though for some reason, which Jimmy Greicci, former owner of Gibbs when they were last on Cape, never explained to me why he made a change, they now come with a large Danny lip instead of the
standard wider lip. I think the older wider lip ones swim better.
The largest Bluefish I ever caught was taken on a Blue Mackerel one, one night off of Nantucket on a September full Moon fishing Old Man Rip with Bobby Perimian on his at that time boat "Foolish Pleasure. We were fishing wire and taking some huge Bass on Gibbs trolling swimmers when I got a tremendous hit which I thought had to be a fish over fifty ( we had a couple 40's in the boat already) because it fought so hard. Well it turned out to be a 23-3/4 pound Bluefish. ( I should have mounted that fish).
Threaded Mode