Some learned and published Professors might doubt I can tell old Algerian briar by smoking it, but I dug out an old damaged run Parker Super Briar Bark that smokes and colors exactly like a Marxman.
The bottom quarter inch of that Parker has never been smoked. There’s the unmistakable aroma and flavor of cinnamon all through the smoke, that intensifies at the bottom.
The value of a New York City made Marxman is the oil cured and aged Algerian briar Marx used.
Dunhill used much the same, except he sandblasted instead of carved his, until the pre war stocks of Algerian were used up.
Of all my New York made Marxman pipes only two are stamped Algerian Briar.
Those could have been made by Louis Cowan in California, from old Marxman stock.
For whatever reason, if a pipe is stamped Algerian briar, it seems likely it was made after the Algerian War of Independence cut off supplies.
We take for granted what we like will always be available.
1945 Winchester Model 12 with Patent Pending Simmons Donut Post Rib and Warsaw made custom stock. The seller believed it was counterfeit. It might be if the gun was made after 1947.
The first of these shipped in the fall of 1945. Winchester sent guns to Earnie Simmons for his patent pending rib. The forend is very recent. The stock is old, but can’t be dated. It could be 1945, though.
And, this very high dollar Model 12 trap was custom fitted to the previous owner, by an expert at Warsaw (or Lincoln) Missouri. See the diagonal line where they tried different comb heights? The only place I know that’s done is a few miles from where I bought the shotgun.
it's really expensive , so I personally do not.
