Blog by Steve Laug

Sometimes the best adventures happen with minimal drama and planning. On Thursday Jeff and I chatted on Facetime. He said that he and Sherry were heading up to Seattle to meet a fellow about some stamps and asked if Irene and I would like to meet up in Bellingham, Washington on Saturday and take our aunt for breakfast. After breakfast we talked about doing a bit of a pipe hunt in Bellingham antique stores and malls. The decision was made and yesterday morning Irene and I and two of our daughters got up early and headed across the Pacific Truck Crossing border between the Canada and the US for the adventure.

We met up at a local eatery and had a great breakfast together with our aunt. We took her to her residence afterwards and visited with her for most of the morning. Together we headed to Old Town Bellingham to begin our pipe hunt. We visited three of my favourite antique malls and worked out way through the aisles of wares for sale. Jeff and I tend to divide and conquer, each walking through the aisles of the shop looking for pipes. The rest of the family moves through looking for their own treasures. In the first shop Jeff and I picked up two pipes – a Sasieni Mayfair Apple and a Sasieni Royal Stuart Billiard. Both were dirty but both contained the Sasieni Magic – classic shapes and nice briar.The second shop is a treasure trove of items from the past and one that I could spend a lot of time working through. As we went through the aisles of treasures I found a case with carved animal pipes and a Ropp Cherrywood, really none of them captured my interest this time around. I looked them over and set them aside. Then I saw an interesting pipe standing in the back of the case. It was called The Pedestal Pipe and was made in Israel – presumably by the Shalom Pipe Manufacturing company. We left the shop with this addition to the hunting bag. We walked down the street to the next shop. It is one that I have visited for over 20 years and come to know the owner. We generally have a great chat on our visits and spent some time chatting and catching up on life. By the time we finsihed chatting we came away with five additional pipes to the hunt bag. These included a Savinelli Sherwood Rock Briar 316KS, a Sir Winston Bellingham WA, a Kensington Made in London England Pot, Genuine Block Meerschaum Opera pipe, and last of all an Oval shank 1/4 Bent pot no name but great grain.We left the shop worked our way to a new shop that I had not visited before. We walked into a nicely laid out shop and I asked the clerk if there were any pipes available. He walked us back to a display case and took out a circular pipe rack. There in the rack were two pipes remaining in it. The first was a square shank Irwin’s (GBD made) London Made London England 9487 shape and the second was an older WDC Royal Demuth Imported Briar Root 25. Both were great and were added to the hunt bag. We called it a day and headed to our favourite Mexican Restaurant for dinner before heading home. It was a great hunt and a great visit with the family. When I got home I went through all the pipes we had found and took photos of the group. There were some great pieces there and some great pieces of pipe history. I made a list of the pipes according to the order in the photos below.

The left column in the photo below:  

1. The Pedestal Pipe Mediterranean Briar Israel
2. The Kensington Made in London Englamd
3. Sasieni Mayfair London Made
4. Irwin’s (GBD) London Made London England 9487
5. Sasieni Royal Stuart Made in England London Made 55

The right column in the photo below:

6. Savinelli Sherwood Rock Briar 316KS
7. Sir Winston Bellingham WA
8. Genuine Block Meerschaum Opera
9. WDC Royal Demuth Imported Briar Root 25
10. Oval shank 1/4 Bent pot no name but great grain

These were going to be a great batch of pipes to work on. Certainly, they would need to be deep cleaned, stems reworked and some replaced and some refinished. It was really going to be a great time gradually chipping a way at the lot. Thanks for coming with us on this pipe hunt. It was a great time to have you with us and the only thing that would have made it better would have been to walk through the hunt together. Enjoy your pipes!