From my research, I have a 1957 Garcia Mitchell 300 (made in France) spinning reel that was given to me by my dad. It has sat in the equipment cabinet for a number of years and would like to get it back into use.

The easy option is to throw it on one of my existing rods, which are modern-ish, low end rods. A part of me thought it might be cool to get my hands on a Garcia Conolon rod from that era, but I know nothing about these rods. Were they any good then? Would they be considered any good now? There seems to be a market on the auction sites, so also wondering what they are worth? Here are the rods mentioned in the owners manual I have for a potenial pairing:

#2101 - 6.5' - Light Action - 4-10# line - 1/4-1/2 oz. lure
#2102 - 7' - Medium Action - 6-10# line - 3/8-5/8 oz. lure
#2112 - 7' - Medium Fast Taper Action - 8-15# line - 5/8-1 1/4 oz. lure
#2508 - 6.5' - Light Fast Taper Action - 4-8# line - 1/4-1/2 oz. lure
#2609 - 6.5' - Light Fast Taper Action - 4-10# line - 1/4-5/8 oz. lure

I have dabbled in rod building, so a bigger stretch would be to create a rod that resembles an old Conolon but has modern materials and technology. This would be fun but a pricier and more time consuming approach that would be tough to make feasible.

Thanks for any help!

I would call the 300 a medium size spinning reel, in general. I used it for years as my main reel for everything - bass, panfish, etc. I know there were smaller reels in the Mitchell line but do not know if there was anything bigger.

It does have large and small capacity spools for heavier (8-15 lb.) and lighter (4-6 lb.) lines.

I'm usually throwing crankbaits like Rapalas, Bombers, and similar. I have been spending some more time with plastics like Senkos, swimming baits, etc.

Everyone used them here in the upper Midwest.I still manually close spinning reels as I had the hand me down reels with messed up bails .The GC rods and Eagle Claws were all we used.300s were for bass catfish etc.308s for panfish stocked trout and our favorite to eat Lake Michigan perch.I gave my brother a new in the black and red 301 and a new in the tube medium heavy GC rod with agate guides for his 50th.All we had back in the day were hand me downs with broken bails and missing guides and short tips.Him being a lefty never knew there left handed versions of mitchell reels.Our gramps gave us casting rods with green Johnson spin cast reels we were thrilled and they worked great.I have a dozen or so GC rods as they were pretty common but not seeing them very much these days.My friend who runs a local bait shop just sold off half a case of those auto bail Mitchells. NIB at 150 a piece .Was hard not to buy one

I've had no experience with Garcia Conolon spinning rods, but in my opinion the fly rods were pretty good, so that may be some indication. A quick check shows that GC spinning rods are available on eBay at reasonable prices so it may be worthwhile to try one just for curiosity's sake.

The Garcia Mitchell reels were indeed available in larger sizes such as the 306 (big) and 302 (probably the biggest). My favorites of the bunch were the 308/408.

Again, I think we're talking about a rod for 300.
Conolon spinning rods were king in the 70s. Fast tapers, and even lighter weight than Phillipson.
I randomly found one light glass rod that I like better, it's an H-I Star, late Gladding era.

Unfortunate photo snap, but my friend's daughter caught a respectable redfish on the Conolon Light Action I show in the photo above.
Next to it, a better photo of her fishing the rod. She's using Penn 716.

braid requires a Good ball-bearing line roller.

for my reels that can't do braid, I like Damyl Tectan mono. It's unusually thin, honest breaking strength rating, handles and casts well.
I used to do Stroft but it became hard to find, my last spool came from Poland via ebay..