Knowledge for Advanced Collectors of Heddon

FULL SITE INDEX & ARTICLES 

By Dr. Michael Echols

"The Florida Special was not catalogued in the 1917 catalogue. This catalogue insert dates to 1918-1920, I'm leaning toward late 1919 due to the fact that both green and perch scale are offered, but those are the only 2 scale finishes, no pike scale, no red scale, etc....dating it to the early stages of scale finish. "

Artistic Box numbered 19S: for the Florida Special 19S

From 1922 Catalog (Clyde Harbin's Heddon Catalogs)

According to Joe Stagnitti, and I quote: " the bait  for this Artistic box is the small size Florida Special, L-rigged, marked prop, white with flitter and more than likely, it will have hand painted gill marks."
 

"The box has the slogan "Stamped on the Metal" on the side, which we know dates to very late 1914 at the earliest, 1915 for sure. The box was obviously used  past 1912 when it was thought the box went out of use.   With all of this info, the box most likely dates to the very late teens, possibly 1920."-

According to William Sonnett: "William T. Heddon alluded to a large number of Artistic boxes in the factory inventory in his 1927 interview. He spoke of how the Artistic Minnow was met with a "wonderful reception" and they could not keep up with the orders until an all out effort was made, then..... "suddenly the public fancy veered and we were caught with 50,000 of this model on the shelves. We finally sold them to a wholesaler for 10 cents each, taking a heavy loss....." My guess is that they didn't sell the boxes, just relabeled them all as the beginning of the #20 closely coincides with the demise of the Artistic minnow. How long did the box last before the supply ran out is anyone's guess." 

This would explain the use of the Artistic box for the Florida Special and the 20.

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