What Did Your Fathers and Grandfathers Smoke?

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I think the lesson in all of this is that most of our forefathers had far lesser choices of tobaccos blends and of much lesser quality than many things out there today, yet they never felt they were doing without. I never knew any of those folks that had more than a half-dozen simple pipes at most, yet they went on to a lifetime of smoking pleasure that yielded my generation. If we have been living in a bubble, it has been a good bubble, but as my grandfathers have proven, not a necessary one.

 

[aldecaker]

It's 2016, and if I have a good cob and some codger blend, I don't feel like I'm doing without, either.

 

[mcitinner1]

How could the all the old farts smoke that crap? I don't even know if I could smoke if my choices were only Carter Hall, Prince Albert, Half and Half and Captain Black...I might quit. How come they couldn't get any real quality tobacco like Sam Gawith back then? :crazy:
Tompowers: One mans Trash is another mans treasure. :clap:
Good God, Tompowers, you must be a raving lunatic. :clap:
It is better to keep your mouth closed and let people think you are a fool than to open it and remove all doubt. :clap:

 

[jefff]

This is what happens when parents leave the computer on and unattended.

 

[mortonbriar]

That photo of the university flake from beerandbaccy, can anyone tell me what the 'mahogony' is all about? its listed with virginia and burley as though its an ingredient rather than an aroma, I am curious since I have not seen any mahogany references in the tobacco realm before, is that instead of the plum flavour it now carries?
My grandfathers both smoked cigarettes, but my wife's Opa smoked amphora in Canada after the war, not sure what he smoked in Holland prior.
Tompowers I have no idea what age group you are but in case you were not there for much of it, last century was a little different.
Isaac

 

[checotah]

How come they couldn't get any real quality tobacco like Sam Gawith back then?

Not sure how it was in other parts of the country, but, where I grew up, there were no tobacconist shops. You wanted tobacco, you got it at the general store, the grocery store, the service station, maybe the pharmacy. Smoking was simply a way of life, not a past time, not a hobby, not an exotic fantasy. People smoked because people smoked. Cigarettes (no filters) and cigars were omnipresent, and pipe tobacco was an alternative, but you took what you could get. English, Aromatics, and the like were simply not around, no one even talked about them. This was late 40's, early 50's. In the 60's, those tobaccos started showing up, but only in larger towns. Rural America was slow to see them.
At least that's how I remember it.

 

[plugugly]

My dad smoked Field and Stream in a Bulldog,probably a Kaywoodie (wish I still had it)and around company, a billiard. I scan ebay for a sealed key-wind can from time to time but so far,no luck. He was also partial to Carter Hall.
Plugugly

 

[hmhaines]

Nobody in my family smoked a pipe, as far as I've been told. My grandfather used to smoke lots of Garcia y Vega cigars when I was a kid, I'm not sure what he smoked when he was a young man. Probably the same thing!
Great grandfather would go down to the corner store every night or every other night, not sure which, get his wife a candy and himself a cigar. Sometimes my grandfather got a comic book out of the deal!

 

[stluisrey]

My grandfather loved rolling his own cigs with Prince Albert. My father loves Peterson flakes. He recently discovered Peterson's 3P's and loves this tobacco.

 

[deathmetal]

Personally, I really enjoy Prince Albert and think highly of Carter Hall. Our near-forebears may have had it better than we think.

 

[mazzeh]

My father (as far as I know) has only ever smoked cigarettes. I haven't seen him in a while so I'm not sure if he still does.
My grandfather was mainly a pipe smoker until he passed away but occasionally smoked cigarettes as well. The only tobacco that I ever saw him smoke was Borkum Riff - Bourbon Whiskey flavour. I don't believe we can get Sir Walter Raleigh here in Australia.
Borkum Riff seems to be the most popular mass market pipe tobacco here that I've seen.
Regards,

Mazzeh

 

[bigpond]

Weed, mostly. All the artsy types were smoking weed or snorting white powder at party's when I was young. Only the farts on the corner has pipes and I would only see them as they walked alone down the streets exiled from home smoking something that smelled like candy.
Fred Gwynne lived at the end of my block in Soho. I would occasionally see him walking down the street smoking something that smelled of cherry. He would cast a really long shadow. Once when I was talking home from preschool (we used to be able to do that), I saw this enormous shadow from something coming from behind me I thought it was a monster and walked the whole block without turning around till I get to my door. To his credit, Fred did have a remarkably flat head.

 

[mackeson]

Grandpa, as a very occasional pipe smoker and regular cig smoker, smoked anything he could get his hands on. I have his old Amphora pipe - so I know what he bought at least one time. Dad has an old Carter hall metal tin. He said he also smoked whatever was available and cheap until he decided the pipe was too much hassle.

 

[pastorpiper]

My dad was a farmer and chewed tobacco and smoked an occasional cigar.

My Grandfather was a farmer and smoked camels.

The farmer down the road smoked pipes (Prince Albert). I LOVED how he smelled, and how laid back he was with his pipe. Always wished my dad smoked a pipe. I'm the only pipe smoker I know in both sides of our family.

 

[mso489]

I'm not sure what my paternal grandfather smoked because he kept the tobacco in an amber jar in the middle of his pipe rack beside his chair in the living room, a rack I now have on my study shelf, but my dad smoked nothing but Granger from high school through age 65 when he quit smoking when starting a second career with a non-smoking work place.

 

[jaytex1969]

Both parents smoked cigs, dad Viceroys and mom Kools. They soon compromised and settled on Salems together. When times got tough, they switched over to Doral menthol.
Dad also had 2 pipes for a while, on a small rack with a big can of Middleton's Cherry in the middle. I don't really recall seeing him smoke them, but he apparently did.
The story goes that mom washed his pipes in soap and water one day and ended his pipe smoking era.

 

[grimpuffer]

My grandfather smoked Carter Hall and Borkum Riff and my father smoked cigars over a pipe (mostly Macanudo)

 

[rmpeeps]

My dad tried but gave it up because a pipe was too much fuss, and he didn’t like cigars just fuming up his nose.

My maternal grandfather smoked Carter Hall and the occasional cigar. When I was a kid he’d sit in his olive green nogahyde vibrating Lazy Boy and puff on a cigar through about 3 ft of garden hose. I think that was him putting on his ‘man of the castle ‘ act for us kids.

 

[npod]

Grandpa smoked Mixture 79 and also cigarettes smashed up in his pipe.

 

[jpmcwjr]

Both parents cigs, father a cigar occasionally. Maternal GF cigs, paternal, dunno.