How Long Have You Smoked a Pipe?

[DesertDan]

I bought my first pipe when I was 15. I still have it, a Dr Graybow bent billiard that I bought at the Rexall drug store near my house. Tolkien was my gateway. Reading The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings inspired my desire to take up the pipe.
I am 59 now. For about 20 years along the way I smoked cigars more than pipes but 8 or so years ago I went back to the pipe. Since then, I have gotten more involved in the "hobby" aspect, expanding my pipe collection and building up a fairly deep cellar with a wide variety of blends.
I do still enjoy the occasional cigar.

 

[Christos D. Tsatsaronis]

Unfortunately I started late, at 47, I'm 55 now. Smoked cigarettes since I was 20 years old.
Unfortunately I still do.
Plus a cigarillo now and then.

 

[keith929]

I have been keeping it smokey for just about 54 years. I started when I was 17.
My mother caught me sneaking her cigarettes so she bought me a pipe for my birthday.
Her thinking was that I would hate it.
Unfortunately for her I took to it like a fish to water.
I still have that pipe.

 

[Snook]

I've been smoking a pipe since 2011 I believe, maybe 2012. A coworker at the time would smoke one once in a while and piqued my interest in the hobby.

 

[telescopes]

1982 - or perhaps late 81. I still have my first pipes and I still smoke them to this day. Forty-two years of pipe smoking and learning more about it each day.

 

[WVOldFart]

Started in 1980 when I was 23 and started my first major job, after college, as Park Naturalist/Program Director at one of the State Parks in West Virginia. My Mentor at the Park was a pipe smoker and my hero, Sherlock Holmes was a pipe smoker so why not me. My first pipe was a Dr. Grabow billiard which I still have somewhere.

 

[Alejo R.]

I'll be 49 in 2024 and I've been smoking and buying pipes since the turn of the century. Other things I buy are mechanical watches and books.

 

[agnosticpipe]

Long enough to know that I now like butterscotch.

 

[sparker69]

I'm starting to forget....(is this what happens to you when you smoke a pipe?!): maybe three or years. Came from Cuban cigars that I was smoking for maybe ten years. Had a friend who smoked a pipe and it intrigued me.

 

[Lees65GTO]

I started smoking a pipe in 1974 when I was 30 (49 years ago). I had been smoking cigarettes for about 16 years and my wife got pregnant and she wanted to quit so I tried to quit to help her but only lasted about 3 or 4 days. I decided to try smoking a pipe to see if it would help. Man did it, I really enjoyed it so much I never looked back and I still love it.

 

[tfdickson]

2024 will make 30 years for me. I was lucky and got started on the right foot with the help of a very knowledgeable tobacconist who didn’t mind that I looked about 12 and was actually 16.

 

[sablebrush52]

I picked up the pipe in 1971 because I loved the scent of pipe tobacco.
There have been times when I didn’t smoke pipes, or smoke much of anything, but it’s been pretty steady for the past 30+ years.
It’s always been about the flavors.

 

[Peter Turbo]

Since July 2020

 

[Winnipeger]

I smoked cigars off and on for about 20 years (with occasional bouts of cigarette addiction), and one day, a few months before my 40th birthday, it just dawned on me to buy a pipe. That was about six and a half years ago.

I guess a large part of what I like about this hobby is the pipes themselves, as artisan objects/functional tools. They're so niche, it almost amazes me that these things are still being manufactured at all. Also the history and tradition is somewhat interesting, but above all, as a basically frivolous hobby, the fact that it runs completely contrary of the trends and trajectory of contemporary society feels very right to me.

Oh...and I also love tobacco, and this is certainly the least harmful way of consuming it in moderation.

 

[Sir Yak]

Title edited for capitalization. Please see Rule 9.

To save everyone the trouble, it's pretty much that everything should be capitalized except articles and most 2-3 letter words.

How long have you been smoking a pipe and at what age did you start? What made you choose pipe smoking?

I bought a horrible little pipe on my honeymoon 20 years ago. I was 20 at the time . I’d been smoking cigars for a couple years but decided to try a pipe after laughing at the scene of the paperboy smoking a pipe in the movie Road to Perdition. My FIL was really into cigars but I found out about that time that he had been into pipes years before. So he helped me get started with pipes and then I eventually got him back into them.

 

[RPK]

What other personal information do you require?

Oh, before you ask, I do indeed enjoy nicotine.

I admire your head gear so I'd be interested in your hat size and if it matched mine I'd swap you some tobacco and matches for it !

 

[mateusbrown]

About two years in with pipes and enjoying it, and about to hit the big 5-0 in March. The idea was that the pipe would replace cigarettes although that has not yet come to pass. Started with cigars about 1992 or so, and smoked them off and on, but consistently smoking cigarettes for the same time span. Cigars have gotten expensive, or I've gotten older and cheaper. I really like the wrapper leaf taste, except for those that have the sweetened tip. I didn't realize that was a thing until I tried, I think it was, a Baccarat Maduro. Not a fan of that. But with an unsweetened cigar, and it might sound a bit gross unless you're a nicotine fiend like me, sometimes when I've smoked a cigar as much as possible, I cut any burned portions off and stick what's left in as a dip, and the leaf flavor gets good and strong after few minutes. But yeah, one decent cigar is about $10 whereas I can get a tin of any C&D pipe tobacco for around $11-12, which lasts for several weeks to a month as I am only averaging about two pipes a day. I found some $3.99 Cuban Rounds cigars, that are not Cuban whatsoever, at this local vape shop, and they are not terrible although not pleasant enough to smoke indoors. They're good for yard and farm work time. But the pipes, though, wish I'd gotten onto them sooner as, once you get your initial investment of a few pipes, provided that you don't catch pipe acquisition disorder, a few tins of pipe tobacco every month is relatively inexpensive. Even if you double or triple your pipe smoking, you are still coming out cheaper.

4 per day x $10 cigars = $40 x 30 days = $1200
1 (2 oz.) tin pipe tobacco per week @ $12 x 4 = $48
1 pack per day cigarettes @ $7 x 30 = $210

 

[marc75]

I've been smoking a pipe for 28 years. My wife got me my first pipe because she didn't like the smell of my cigars. Still have the pipe. It was from a shop in Bellmore long Island. Can't remember the name of it. They had brair blocked every where and made them in house.

 

[fishmansf]

Unfortunately I started late, at 47, I'm 55 now. Smoked cigarettes since I was 20 years old.
Unfortunately I still do.
Plus a cigarillo now and then.

You should give Swedish snus a try to help kick the cigs!

 

[Steddy]

Only two years so I am still a new pipe smoker.