Bamboo Heirlooms and Cane Twizzle Sticks

“There are vintage bamboo rods that are worth between $1,000 and $10,000, made by a handful of American craftsmen from the 1930s through the 1960s who were the Stradivariuses and Amatis of their trade. Those rods carry legendary names like Gillum, Garrison, Leonard, Payne and Young. But for every handcrafted rod from a master, factories churned out thousands that are worth a few hundred dollars at most.” Eric Sharp writes about the realities of bamboo rod valuations in the Detroit Free Press. One interesting section of his article describes the tip of a 6 1/2 -foot Leonard Baby Catskill made about 50 years ago: it’s six strips of bamboo made a tip that was only 30/1000 of an inch in diameter.