R. L. Winston Rod Co.

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WHILE THE YEAR 1929 is a rather infamous date in financial circles, it is cherished by anglers worldwide. For that is the year, following the stock market crash, that Robert Winther and Lew Stoner acquired the Western Fishing Rod Company of San Francisco. Almost immediately, the bamboo rods these two men built earned a reputation for performance and exceptional quality. These rods were called "Winstons", a contraction of the two men's last names.
In 1933, Robert Winther sold his interest to employee Red Loskot, an accomplished fisherman and member of the Golden Gate Angling Club. The next year, Stoner developed a patented hollow-fluted rod design for use in tournament casting competition. In the next few years, rods using this design would shatter a number of world distance casting records.
In 1945, Doug Merrick took a job at Winston. In 1953, he purchased Red Loskot's interest. When Lew Stoner died in 1957, Merrick became sole owner. The 50s are also when Winston began using a new material to build rods: fiberglass.
The tradition of rodbuilding excellence continued in the 60s, when renowned angler and hotelier Charles Ritz, President of the International Fario Club in Paris, presents Merrick with a medal for "Outstanding work and knowledge pertaining to split bamboo rods."
The 1970s were years of change at Winston. Tom Morgan purchased the company from Merrick, and a year later Glenn Brackett became a partner. In 1975, Winston began building rods from graphite and in '76, the decision was made to move the company from San Francisco to Twin Bridges, Montana in order to be near the world-class trout fishing of the Beaverhead, Big Hole and Jefferson rivers.
The 1980s saw the introduction of IM6 graphite, which is still used in our WT trout rods.
David Ondaatje bought Winston from Morgan and Brackett in 1991. Under his leadership, the company began rolling its own blanks, moved to a larger rodbuilding facility in Twin Bridges, and introduced such groundbreaking rod designs as LT 5-piece trout rods, the Joan Wulff Favorite and BL5 and XTR rods, both of which utilized advanced boron/graphite composite.
In 2004, we introduced our Boron IIx rods, a lightweight, very powerful fast action series. Using the newest advances in 2nd generation boron/graphite technology, they feature the widest casting range of any rods we've ever made. 2006 saw the introduction of our Vapor and Ascent rods. These two rod series offer entry-level anglers Winston quality at a very affordable price.
NEW for 2007 are our Boron IIt rods. This series combines the feel of our traditional action rods with the lightness and responsiveness of our Boron II technology.