February 2013
Surprise Minnow
Pflueger (Enterprise Mfg Co)
Akron, OH
1915
Pflueger (pronounced Flew-ger) started making fishing lures very early on in America. Starting as early as the 1860’s, Plueger grew as a company and was arguably the largest tackle manufacturer in the USA in the early 1900s.
In 1915, Plueger introduced a rather unique lure call the Surprise Minnow. This lure had a groove cut in the wood of the lure to help it dive shallow when retrieved…and it also gave it a “smiling” feature. This lure also feature drilled holes in the lure for eyes, which also was advertised as causing the lure to “bubble like a fish” when retrieved just under the surface. Of course, this attracted the big ones. I don’t know about you, but the only fish I see bubble are in cartoons….
Sometime in the early 1920s, the eyes were converted to the more popular glass eyes. By the 1930s, the metal diving lip become a diving lure standard, and the Surprise Minnow was no longer manufactured.
The Surprise Minnow pictured is painted in the color “rainbow” that was used by more lure manufacturers at the time. Even though this lure is nearly 100 years old and it is dirty, the color still looks great!
