Gardner Marsh - 'the great Atlantic caster from Nantucket'
Collection of Photographs of Gardner D. Marsh, prize-winning salt water angler of Eel Point, Nantucket.
[Various places: 1950s].
Price: $3,000.00
About the item
17 x 12 inches and smaller (most approx. 8 x 10 inches or smaller). Gardner Marsh - 'the great Atlantic caster from Nantucket'. Old pin holes, some soiling or wear, occasional losses, generally very good.
Item #238882
Interesting group of photographs of Nantucket angler Gardner D. Marsh, "the first great surf caster. Dressed in killer black hip boots and foul weather jacket, Gardiner [sic], despite the primitive bamboo rod and heavy braided nylon line, practically invented modern surf casting, could lay his drail in the mouth of a bluefish 100 yards off Smith Point in the face of a 20-knot sou'westerly. He taught us all, but peccadilloes did him in, and he was deported from the island, ended up in Florida, much to our loss" (C.S. Lovelace, Memoirs of a Lost Island [2007], pp. 35-6).
Gardner Duane Marsh was a graduate of St. Albans School and Dartmouth College (class of 1941), a veteran of the Army Air Corps, and a long-time fixture in Nantucket. His renown extended to other waters, for Kip Farrington called him "the great Atlantic caster from Nantucket" (Fishing the Pacific, Offshore and on [1953], p. 113).
- Portrait of GM and George Heinold, inscribed "To Gardner Marsh if there is a better surf caster, I haven't met him. Many thanks for teaching me how to handle the long sticks, I never used one that long before, George Heinold" Heinold (1916-1982) was a columnist for Outdoor Life.
- GM holding "Striped Bass from the Surf Nantucket Island" (42 & 35 lbs).
- GM holding two striped bass, 41-1/2 and 35 pounds, before a hardware store window with display of tackle.
- GM with S. Kip Farrington on the beach beside a parked station wagon, with the notation "World's no. 1 Angler, any fish any water", Farrington holding a rod, the two men holding a large lure between them.
- GM with Chisie Farrington on the beach beside a parked station wagon, both holding rods, with the notation "only woman in world who ever caught 2 Broadbill in one day & 1 world record she holds now" (with a worn and torn example of the same photograph, similar notation).
- GM with three striped bass hanging from the sign of the Eel Point Anglers Club (with losses at top and bottom right).
- GM with large striped bass, noted 62-3/4 pounds and dated 1950 on the mount.
- GM with trophies for catching most game fish on the Atlantic coast during the 1950 season, surfcasting from Nantucket Island (600 fish, bass and blues, 6131 lbs.).
- GM with two striped bass, captioned on mount "A fine November day on 'The Point' at Hatteras - before the bridge & the people".
- Group of nine photographs of a trip to Cape Hatteras, November 1950, captioned on the glass (cracked).
- Home made plaque with relief sculpture of two whales, logo of Cabo Blanco Fishing Club, Peru, and medallion of St. Francis , signed Gardner Duane M- on back
- Group photograph of Phi Kappa Psi fraternity, Dartmouth, GM fifth from right, top row, captioned on back "I am 21 years old here, just prior to going to 2nd World War for 4-1/2 years"
- St. Albans School baseball team, GM fifth from left, seated, note on back of frame, "I am 18 years old here"
