It appears to be an urban myth that FWK Wallis designed the rod for Hardy and that they, in turn, made Allcock take the 'Wallis' part off their rod. Otherwise how do we explain that in the late Sixties, just before they were closed down, Allcock once more put his name on their rod. here is just such a rod, in a somewhat brighter green hue than is normal post 1964:
In it's simplest form the Allcock Wizard has three versions; the pre-War green-dyed version...actually meant to be a black dye originally, I think. This rod appears in the Allcock Guides as early as 1936 and was offered as a wooden handled rod, a cork sheet covered wooden handled rod and the latter also offered with all-lined guides. It is the cork-lined handled rod that we see the most. The rod is also noticeable for having some new 'stand-off' rings designed for it...not the lined ones though. Always whipped in light green, there are few originals. This rod is very light and 'through' in action and although described as 'killing' huge salmon for FWK it took him several hours to do so. Not sport in modern terms, I think we could agree?
Here is the label which uses the name of the designer, with the two words in different fonts:
The only image I have, I think this has been touched-up
The second version appeared after the war when it was very hard to get female Japanese cane of the same standard for the butt section and the rod was 'improved' with a larger diameter cane used, which stiffened the butt up considerably. These rods bore Allcock's new transfer, the gold oval with red lettering, versions of which has appeared pre-war, but now all rods bore it. these rods were whipped in crimson.These rods also gained tenoned male ferrules, or counters as indicated here by Dick Walker when discussing another rod:
At some time the rod lost these ferrules and plain counters were fitted, creating the third version.
The very last rods gained the a brighter orange-tinged whipping and in the final years, as mentioned above, the transfer was changed to a pale green, white and black one to reflect the merger with Youngs and later Lee, (whose colours they were before)
Various other makers copied the rod, Aero...a short-lived breakaway from Aspindale, Aspindale themselves and also an ex-Aspindale employee who made rods for others, notably Tom Watson the tackle shop owner in Nottingham.
All the above rods vary considerably due to slight design changes and cane quality.
Are they really an 'Avon' rod? I don't think so .... they are far too finely tipped to deal with big weights and big rivers well and there are better rods out there to do the job. Are they lovely and desirable? Not really as the handle is far too short, it being designed for Nottingham casting by FWK where the reel is below the hand and thus exerts far more effect on the balance of the rod. Several fellers have extended the handle upwards towards the butt ring and others have created handle extensions to lengthen the rod, but none of these really restore the balance the rod was originally created with unless you put the reel in what most of us would feel is the wrong place. We know now that a lead weight under the butt cap doesn't really do it either......
Here's FWK holding the rod and you can see where the reel is:
Now all of the above is just my opinion of course, and many anglers love their Wizards.
So much so that John Ollif-Cooper re-built a few with black labels added to them and sold them at a considerably high price. I know he created five, with one in a green dye that he kept, though later offered unsuccessfully on eBay.
So highly prized were these rods that at least two copies of his version of the rods were made and also offered on eBay..one whipped in green and one with a sparkly black to the 'black label'. Only the green whipped one had the original three rings on the tip section.
I have images of ALL these rods should they ever resurface.
There's no point in turning my back on the elephant in the room here, I was in the past, very critical of JOC for the manner in which he suggested these rods were original offerings from Allcock. But nevertheless, I have been assured by several owners that they are superb rods with which they would never part....and indeed I have only ever seen one on eBay, other than JOC's own green one.
What is beyond doubt though, is JOC's ability to turn out a rod every bit as well finished as any rod maker out there...and I include the esteemed Edward Barder in that statement. Just to show my point, here is just one image of a JOC black labelled Wizard refurb:
Note the compressed guide on the tip section, presumably so as not to interfere with the curve of the cane under load
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