It has been more than 35 yearssince Jerry Sylvester suffered afatal heart attack while he wasout fishing for striped bass; yet

he is still remembered by RhodeIslanders as having done more tobring attention to striper fishing inthat state than any other person.

Sylvester was born in PortDeposit, Maryland in 1896. When hewas three months old his parentsreturned to their native Italy wherehe was raised on a farm. His familyreturned to the United States whenhe was sixteen years old and settledin Waterbury, Connecticut.

After Jerry married, he moved toNew York City where he was

employed for more than 16 years asa chauffer for Mr. Thomas Ewing, Jr.The Ewings owned a surfside man-sion in Narragansett and took Jerrywith them when they vacationedthere. With lots of spare time on hishands, Jerry soon discovered RhodeIsland had plenty of stripers. WhenJerry brought the Ewings back toNew York, he would hit theRockaways and fish those beachesvery hard. By 1939 he was so hookedby the sport that Jerry and his wifeEdna decided that he would leavehis chauffer job and open up a Baitand Tackle shop in Narragansett. Hefished day and night with localsharpies, Chris Boldt and Honk

Saltwater Classics(# 18 in a Series)

by Frank Pintauro and Ed Poore

Jerry Sylvester: A Rhode Island Legend

The "Notice" that came with this plug strongly indicates World War IIvintage, with its reference to "the shortage of manufacturing materials."

Sylvester with a load of schoolie stripers taken on light bait casting tackle in the 1950s.

Carved-eye Flaptails with rare brown box; c. 1945.

Sylvester with charter boat Captain DickLema and a huge catch of stripers and bluescaught night-fishing with eels off Charleston,R.I. Three of the bass were over 40 pounds.

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Two early 1940 surface swimmer prototypes attributed to Jerry Sylvester. These pieces came out of an auction in North Kingston, R.I.along with 5 brown boxed Sylvester plugs featured in this article.

Circa 1945 version of Sylvester's Blue Mullet sub-surface swimmer.Package is very rare and came out of the North Kingston, R.I. "find."

Sylvester on the cover of Outdoor Life Magazine.

Two more Jerry's Jointed lures. This top-lure variation cameout of a Philadelphia tackle shop.

Glass-eyed Flaptails from the early Fishmaster SportingGoods era. The middle plug was a non-catalogued color and isextremely rare.

Super slick glass-eyed model Sylvester Flaptail in the early brown box. Itis unusual to find these baits in the brown boxes.

Sylvester was written up inmany national magazines andbooks, but in 1956 he reversedroles and tried his hand atwriting his own first book.

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Sylvester ad in June 21,1946 issue of Salt WaterSportsman. His Blue MulletPlug was already beginningto make waves with thestriper crowd.

Jerry's Jointed -- A lure that dove deep and had great wiggle action.Side-panel identification of the various lure packaging fromthe Fishmaster era.

The "rarest of the rare." Glass-eyed Junior Sylvester Flaptails.

This Sylvester ad inthe June 27, 1952

issue of Salt WaterSportsman highlights

his new Floater.

No-eyed Sylvester Flaptails from the later Fishmaster era.

Two more Sylvester Flaptail models. Both came with ametal chin guard. The no-eyed model came with an unat-tached metal flapper in the box which indicates that it was the fisherman's discretion to use it or not.

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Clark, using metal squids, eelskinlures, and eel tails while Edna ranthe shop.

During World War II Jerryworked as a checker at the QuonsetNaval Air Station, but he still man-aged some time to fish. On July 25,1944, while fishing a Jap Feather inrugged Nathan's Cove, he caught a57-pound striper on 6-thread (18-lbtest) line which established a worldrecord.

The Sylvesters sold bait, maderods, and molded squids for theirclients. He was a keen observer ofthe baitfish stripers feed on. Luckyfor us that it was the great mulletruns of early fall that gave him theidea for a special mullet flaptail.And thanks to the discovery of a1951 Outdoor Life article on Sylvester,we can back up what we alwaysthought about Jerry -- and that isthat he was probably one of the first(if not the first) striped bass luremakers on the East Coast:

“With two years of experi-menting behind it, Jerry's bluemullet plug hit the Rhode Islandsurf in 1943. Casters found it tobe a saucy, frenzied splasherwith a free wheeling metal tailthat churned foam. And how itstirred up September bass!Jerry's best with it so far: a 50and 52 pounder.” (Outdoor Life,August 1951)

This means Sylvester was pro-ducing lures and prototypes as earlyas 1941. Pretty amazing, especiallysince there was a scarcity of materi-als to work with during World WarII America!

With the War over in 1945, Jerrywas able to reopen his tackle shop. Itdid not take long for the place tobecome a central location for stripedbass information in that area.Everyone dropped in at Jerry's foradvice, and he would gladly leadthem to where the fish were biting.

In 1948, after a strong blow,Sylvester went with a rigged eel toQuohogue Rock at dusk. While cast-

ing to a far off ledge he hooked abass he swears was 80+ pounds andtook more than 400 feet of line on thefirst run. He got the fish to within 75feet of the rock he was standing onand lost it. Sylvester said when youhooked a fish that big, it was like“holding onto a 10-ton cement truckwith your teeth.”

Fish tale or not, people believedhis story. Outdoor writers aroundthe country like Jim Hurley, RayTrullinger, Ray Camp, and StanSmith wrote him up; and his reputa-tion as a guide grew to mythical sta-tus as he fished with some ofHollywood's biggest stars like ClarkGabel and David Niven.

The Flaptail was Sylvester'sfavorite lure to use in the fall duringthe beginning of the stripers' migra-tion. You can see from the photoswith this article how his stylechanged from the very early carved-eye era of the 1940s to the later glass-eye and no-eyed lures of theFishmaster Sporting Goods era.

Ever the innovator, Jerry alsodeveloped a “splasher rig” original-ly intended to catch Pollack butdeadly on stripers. To this day a ver-sion of it is still used to catch earlyseason stripers. In his later yearsJerry Spent his winters in Floridaand began using light surf rods forsmall and medium stripers.

Jerry Sylvester was consideredone of the best striper fishermen ever!He claimed to have caught more than22,000 striped bass over a 30-yearperiod, including numerous 40 and50 pounders; and his reputation tran-scended his local Rhode Island roots.He was truly a Striper Master. �

(Many thanks to Roy Curley andBob Hart for providing us withbaits from their collection. Pleaseknow much of the information inthis article was compiled from con-versations I had with Vlad Evanoff,newspaper clippings, and sportingarticles. Readers wishing to contactFrank Pintauro may do so by call-ing (516) 741-7044 or emailingMasterlure@aol.com)

Sylvester said when you hooked a fish that big, it was like “holding onto a10-ton cement truck with your teeth.”

September-October, 2006 47

Winter: 954 566-1286Summer: 336 385-6879

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