A Barling Rather Than A Barling's

[owen]

I exchanged a few words with Sablebrush yesterday on another thread about the time following the Family Period. This is a recently acquired Barling which has some characteristics of my Barling's Make pipes. Hopefully illustrating the point Sablebrush makes on Pipedia that the quality didn't disappear overnight and that nice pipes for good prices are available.

 

[matchstickman]

All I can say is that the stem needs some TLC but the grain on that pipe is impressive. I like it!

 

[mikethompson]

Same here, the grain on the briar looks very nice. The stem should clean up nicely too. I've seen much worse examples polish up very well.

 

[ssjones]

Piece of cake, should clean up nicely!

 

[dmcmtk]

A very good example Owen.

 

[sablebrush52]

Hi Owen,
Perfect example. This pipe has a cursive or script Barling logo. No apostrophe and no "s". This change of nomenclature came about as part of a revamped line that was announced in November of 1962. By this time, Finlay had removed the Barling family from any active role in running the company, and brought in management from their own company. In February of 1963, Finlay would be absorbed by Imperial when Imperial exercised its option to purchase the rest of the Finlay stock it didn't already own.
People think that somehow the quality immediately went down, but that's not exactly the case, and while the quality eventually did suffer due to the increase in product ranges and productivity, a lot of excellently made pipes continued to be made in the two Barling factories.