hi, any help with this would be greatly appreciated. i bought this meerschaum in a pipe shop in london (on charing cross road, i believe) in 2003. it cost me 80 pounds. i'm ashamed to admit i bought it when i had only been casually smoking for a year and knew practically nothing about pipes. i bought it because it looked cool and i really wanted a meerschaum.
however, let me emphasize i was lucky and i am satisfied with it to this day. it is incredibly durable, solid, and smokes like a dream. holding it in your hand is like holding a warm stone.
but now my curiosity is eating me alive. it's so mysterious! clearly, it resembles one of the old peterson african block meerschaum system pipes (like this one). it has a rugged finish, is almost identical in shape, and was precolored in much the same way. beyond that, it gets weird! if you observe the pictures you'll see:
1. it has no steel ring like all system standard pipes, but the meerschaum is smooth where the ring should(?) be.
2. the system stem is, for lack of a better word, "false." i actually like this, however, because it's much more snug.
3. the stem EVEN HAS A P ON IT, but it's a plain block-print P, not the stylized peterson P. this is even more odd because, as those of you who own systems know, peterson doesn't usually (if ever) mark a system stem at all. it was difficult to capture the P on film, as the white wore away long ago, so i included two photos, one with flash, one without.
now, my questions are:
a. is this some peterson knock-off? if so, it is remarkably high quality. why would a pipemaker that does such good work want to steal another company's name, even one like peterson? (i cannot recall if the pipe was advertised as a peterson in the shop, because in those days i had no idea what a peterson was).
b. if not, is this some weird peterson prototype that somehow made it into a shop?
c. or is it not connected to peterson at all?
thanks again for any help! now for the photos:
however, let me emphasize i was lucky and i am satisfied with it to this day. it is incredibly durable, solid, and smokes like a dream. holding it in your hand is like holding a warm stone.
but now my curiosity is eating me alive. it's so mysterious! clearly, it resembles one of the old peterson african block meerschaum system pipes (like this one). it has a rugged finish, is almost identical in shape, and was precolored in much the same way. beyond that, it gets weird! if you observe the pictures you'll see:
1. it has no steel ring like all system standard pipes, but the meerschaum is smooth where the ring should(?) be.
2. the system stem is, for lack of a better word, "false." i actually like this, however, because it's much more snug.
3. the stem EVEN HAS A P ON IT, but it's a plain block-print P, not the stylized peterson P. this is even more odd because, as those of you who own systems know, peterson doesn't usually (if ever) mark a system stem at all. it was difficult to capture the P on film, as the white wore away long ago, so i included two photos, one with flash, one without.
now, my questions are:
a. is this some peterson knock-off? if so, it is remarkably high quality. why would a pipemaker that does such good work want to steal another company's name, even one like peterson? (i cannot recall if the pipe was advertised as a peterson in the shop, because in those days i had no idea what a peterson was).
b. if not, is this some weird peterson prototype that somehow made it into a shop?
c. or is it not connected to peterson at all?
thanks again for any help! now for the photos:
