An interesting era of fishing items made at Government run and privately operated engineering maintenance workshops.  Engineers, Toolmakers and highly skilled Fitter & Turners, who in some circumstances were on emergency stand-by maintenance duties at Government run maintenance  Workshops . Some of these skilled employees engaged during their spare time in hobby craft by producing their own much loved models of fishing equipment. Blackfish reels, Crouch type reels, Fly reels, Game reels, Seamartin type reels and fishing Lures were often popular items created by these enthusiasts during the maintenance and production down-times. During those down-times a floor supervisor would approach an employee and say: “Work on your foreigner”. This was done to create an impression in the eyes of senior production managers that workers were busily engaged in company work projects.Thus these workshop-made reels, or any other items made during these 'down-times' were known or referred to as “Foreigners”.

It is also pertinent to state that especially during the war periods (i.e. WWI and WWII), due to war effort production, there were shortages of fishing items on the retail market. Hence these workshop practices were especially common during those turbulent times. Ladd B. 2007.

Depicted below are examples of Blackfish - Luderick reels made at various Workshops in Australia.