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The Codger Cabin

Columbo

Mr. Codgers Neighborhood
From The Cabin Coffee Table — An occasional look back at what the old Codgers saw and smoked (with a little detour and frolic, here and there):


A pipe with a talking face. Creepy. I don’t think even Blackstone can pull off that one. But Frank can. Frank also has X-ray vision, and can see the 66 flaps inside his filters. “S.M.” Frank. Maybe Frank worked for the Daily Planet, too.




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Columbo

Mr. Codgers Neighborhood
From The Cabin Coffee Table — An occasional look back at what the old Codgers saw and smoked (with a little detour and frolic, here and there):


We finally see a smoking pipe institution at the coffee table. Dr. Grabow. The name of a Chicago area physician who had nothing whatsoever to do with pipe making. Linkman (the actual pipe maker, and inventor of a breakthrough machine) used the good doctor’s name for a line of improved and ‘healthier’ pipes. Dr. Grabow liked to fish, though. Close enough.

Besides being affordable and reliable smokers, Linkman’s Grabows pioneered a true breakthrough, the machine pre-smoked pipe. Pre-smoked with Edgeworth no less. We see repeated cross-marketing references between the two companies over many years. Edgeworth would offer Linkman pipes, and Linkman would pre-smoke Edgeworth in their pipes.

Alongside Grabow, Linkman at this time also offered more up-market Hollycourt pipes, which featured a more complex drilling pattern, and was advertised as the “Miracle Pipe”. No miracles or magic with the value-priced Grabow’s, just good old American know-how in a good quality pipe. Grabow would eventually become the de facto OTC pipe, found at nearly every drug and grocery store in America. Grabow later acquired the competing upscale Royalton line (which we’ll also see at the coffee table), eventually moved from Chicago to North Carolina, and remains with us today. Alas, Hollycourt is no more.

But in a move of near-magic, Grabow would in later years completely abandon the condensing stinger that Linkman preferred and built the brand on, in favor of a 6mm paper baffle filter that not even S.M. Frank could see through.

And as we will eventually see at the coffee table, Linkman also was a major supplier to our fighting forces once America entered WWII, and produced several full-page print ads during the War that are now considered classics among Grabow enthusiasts.

Dr. Grabow. The Chevrolet of pipes. At one time, there was one parked in nearly every pipe rack in America.



41-4-14.jpg
 

Columbo

Mr. Codgers Neighborhood
From The Cabin Coffee Table — An occasional look back at what the old Codgers saw and smoked (with a little detour and frolic, here and there):


41-4-21.2.jpg
 
From The Cabin Coffee Table — An occasional look back at what the old Codgers saw and smoked (with a little detour and frolic, here and there):


We finally see a smoking pipe institution at the coffee table. Dr. Grabow. The name of a Chicago area physician who had nothing whatsoever to do with pipe making. Linkman (the actual pipe maker, and inventor of a breakthrough machine) used the good doctor’s name for a line of improved and ‘healthier’ pipes. Dr. Grabow liked to fish, though. Close enough.

Besides being affordable and reliable smokers, Linkman’s Grabows pioneered a true breakthrough, the machine pre-smoked pipe. Pre-smoked with Edgeworth no less. We see repeated cross-marketing references between the two companies over many years. Edgeworth would offer Linkman pipes, and Linkman would pre-smoke Edgeworth in their pipes.

Alongside Grabow, Linkman at this time also offered more up-market Hollycourt pipes, which featured a more complex drilling pattern, and was advertised as the “Miracle Pipe”. No miracles or magic with the value-priced Grabow’s, just good old American know-how in a good quality pipe. Grabow would eventually become the de facto OTC pipe, found at nearly every drug and grocery store in America. Grabow later acquired the competing upscale Royalton line (which we’ll also see at the coffee table), eventually moved from Chicago to North Carolina, and remains with us today. Alas, Hollycourt is no more.

But in a move of near-magic, Grabow would in later years completely abandon the condensing stinger that Linkman preferred and built the brand on, in favor of a 6mm paper baffle filter that not even S.M. Frank could see through.

And as we will eventually see at the coffee table, Linkman also was a major supplier to our fighting forces once America entered WWII, and produced several full-page print ads during the War that are now considered classics among Grabow enthusiasts.

Dr. Grabow. The Chevrolet of pipes. At one time, there was one parked in nearly every pipe rack in America.



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There are more than a few in my rotation, all estates. In the 60s/70s they offered some pretty cool shapes, and their sandblasts were top notch. I know, many were too small by today's standards and most had more pits than the Sea of Tranquility, but they cranked them out by the millions so it's not hard to find nice examples. And, unlike Kaywoodies, the condenser was pressure-fit so you could just pull it out if you didn't like that feature.
 

Columbo

Mr. Codgers Neighborhood
There are more than a few in my rotation, all estates. In the 60s/70s they offered some pretty cool shapes, and their sandblasts were top notch. I know, many were too small by today's standards and most had more pits than the Sea of Tranquility, but they cranked them out by the millions so it's not hard to find nice examples. And, unlike Kaywoodies, the condenser was pressure-fit so you could just pull it out if you didn't like that feature.

They are good pipes. My son kept swiping mine, until I finally started buying him his own.

I only have two later production ones left. A Royalton with a thimble-sized chamber, but it is a wonderful piece of briar, perfectly made, perfectly drilled and finished, and smokes very well for a shorter time. And a spacious Grand that is an excellent long-haul smoker. Both are part of my forest 'walking brigade'. I still occasionally get a bug for the old Eldorados, but at this point I've had enough nice pipes.

The best compliment to these pipes is the back-handed compliment paid to other, far more expensive, ones: "It smokes nearly as well as my Grabows."
 
I'm seriously toying with the idea of picking up as many production and matches of these as I can get my hands on and sending samples out to the regulars of this thread. Do our own Codger Reviews somewhere here. As a younger fella here I'm really curious to see what I'm missing from my grandfather's day.
 

steveclarkus

Goose Poop Connoisseur
I'm seriously toying with the idea of picking up as many production and matches of these as I can get my hands on and sending samples out to the regulars of this thread. Do our own Codger Reviews somewhere here. As a younger fella here I'm really curious to see what I'm missing from my grandfather's day.
My dad (likely your grandfather’s contemporary) smoked only one brand, Half and Half) and the other pipe smokers had their own preferred blend - just the opposite of today’s pipers. It is interesting to try every old blend we can find - current production as well as matches. You put me onto Match Field & Stream last year and I’ve been smoking it all day. If you hadn’t touted it, I may never have had the enjoyment of it. Thanks
 
RG, I'm kind of in the same camp as you. Sir Walter and his cousin R.O. Matic, Half & Half (prob. my favorite to date), Carter Hall, Granger, Matches Field & Stream and Edgeworth, and now I'm considering trying Match Bond Street (now called Bourbon St.) and Match Briggs. I've bought Match Walnut, but haven't smoked it much; I'm waiting for cooler weather to try more of the Englishes.

Like many of you I'm curious about what our grandfathers' day had to offer. And I love the idea of smoking something that was readily available in the long-ago time when you could stroll down to the local drugstore on a soft evening after supper, and pick up a pouch of H & H or a tin of Edgeworth. Plus the latest issue of The Saturday Evening Post for the next installment of one of their serials or a new story by this "science-fiction" writer Robert A. Heinlein. . . .
 

Columbo

Mr. Codgers Neighborhood
… And I love the idea of smoking something that was readily available in the long-ago time when you could stroll down to the local drugstore on a soft evening after supper, and pick up a pouch of H & H or a tin of Edgeworth. Plus the latest issue of The Saturday Evening Post for the next installment of one of their serials or a new story by this "science-fiction" writer Robert A. Heinlein. . . .

Among my dearest life memories are walking into a news stand shop on a warm summer evening. The tired sun slowly retiring in the distance. Lights just coming on. A soft breeze getting cooler. Big cars rolling past as you trot down the sidewalk … opening a green wooden screen door … no air conditioning … paper everywhere … the distinctive smell of stacks and stacks of newsprint, magazines, and paperbacks, mingling with freshly opened tobacco, in what in retrospect was aromatherapy … the slam of an ice cream novelty freezer lid in the back, as kids tire of the comics racks … a wall of candy and gum as you approach the register … coins dancing on a worn laminate counter as they ring it up.

Walking out through that screen door with your treats and pleasures for the evening, as the door obeys a long ropey spring and slams behind you … but reluctant to let you completely leave … as the smells and hustle and bustle linger on for a few seconds more back out on the pavement. It was a soothing experience every time.

Glad I lived it, and sad that these experiences are now basically gone from the landscape.
 

Columbo

Mr. Codgers Neighborhood
From The Cabin Coffee Table — An occasional look back at what the old Codgers saw and smoked (with a little detour and frolic, here and there):


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Atomic power of one kind or another had been a staple in the SF pulp magazines for some years before this. The man in the street might not have had any idea how atomic forces worked, but he'd surely heard the term by this time.

In the penultimate panel, the young guy Judge rRobbins is talking with looks kind of like Christopher Reeve as Clark Kent. (Reeve reportedly based his Clark on Cary Grant's nerdy paleontologist in Bringing Up Baby, which appeared only 4 years before this ad. Maybe the artist was going on that.)
 
Atomic power of one kind or another had been a staple in the SF pulp magazines for some years before this. The man in the street might not have had any idea how atomic forces worked, but he'd surely heard the term by this time.

In the penultimate panel, the young guy Judge rRobbins is talking with looks kind of like Christopher Reeve as Clark Kent. (Reeve reportedly based his Clark on Cary Grant's nerdy paleontologist in Bringing Up Baby, which appeared only 4 years before this ad. Maybe the artist was going on that.)

That may BE Clark, secretly investigating the sinister Electrothanasia Ray...
 

Columbo

Mr. Codgers Neighborhood
From The Cabin Coffee Table — An occasional look back at what the old Codgers saw and smoked (with a little detour and frolic, here and there):


Ronson. At one time a major American lighter manufacturer. And one that any codger was delighted to receive as a classy gift, especially if it was a touch-tip model. Even though he still used a Zippo or matches outside.



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