Yarnspinner68
Active member
- Joined
- Sep 29, 2017
- Messages
- 38
- Reaction score
- 11
I don’t expect too many to remember me from way back when, but be that as it may I’ve found that pipe smokers can start a friendship over a bowl and continue it for many many years between contact. We share of love of fine tobacco and craftsmanship and that can be enough.
I took up the pipe as a method of nostalgia for my grandfather. Grandpa passed away when I was about ten and he always had a pipe going. He smoked Dr. Grabows and once a Petersen that was gifted to him. Rum & Maple was his blend of choice but he wouldn’t turn his nose up to Paladin or any of the other common drug store tobaccos of the time. He would also buy twist chewing tobacco and, after finishing his chew, would set it on top of whatever fence post was handy. A few days in the sun to dry out and he’d put it into his tobacco pouch with whatever was in there “to stretch it out.”
I bought my first pipe (Dr Grabow) when I was 21 along with a pouch of Paladin. Between you the occasional Rum & Maple (when I could find it) and the everpresent cherry blends, I tasted the occasional higher end pipe tobacco and enjoyed it. That lead me to tryin cigars and JR Cigars after moving to North Carolina. The first exposure to pipes and cigars I had on the internet was through the JR Cigars forum.
The epic battles between the “herfer” and the “stokers” on that board lead me and a few others to break away and form Stokers’ Haven in Yahoo groups. Man! Those were some good times! I don’t know about anyone else, but I know I learned a lot about pipes and tobaccos there...as well as a lot about myself. I also got to know some fantastic people. Sometime around 2005 or 2006 I got a promotion at work that ended up taking up a LOT of my time and I turned Stokers’ Haven over to one of the other members there (I honestly can’t remember who) and took a hiatus from online forums.
Work continued and grew more complicated. I got better at it and took on more responsibilities. Lovely Wife’s career developed and we ended up moving to where we are now at the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains in Virginia just south of Roanoke. I smoked more cigars than pipes for convenience sake, but still kept pipes around and smoked them from time to time.
I’m still in the same position at work, but ten years has evolved it into something more manageable. We live on a sizable piece of land in the country where I am actively planting fruit trees and vegetable because it’s what I enjoy and I want to be as self sufficient as possible by the time I retire in 20-25 years. I am a licensed ham radio operator and now have room to put up antennas so I can indulge that interest as well. And...I still smoke my pipes. The good thing about switching mostly to cigars for all those years is that my pipe tobacco stash has aged nicely while it waits on me to get back to it.
I look forward to meeting the new people in the community here and reacquainting myself with those with more history. Thanks to those who have continued the legacy of providing a place for us “stokers” to gather.
Bryant/Yarnspinner68
Franklin County, VA
I took up the pipe as a method of nostalgia for my grandfather. Grandpa passed away when I was about ten and he always had a pipe going. He smoked Dr. Grabows and once a Petersen that was gifted to him. Rum & Maple was his blend of choice but he wouldn’t turn his nose up to Paladin or any of the other common drug store tobaccos of the time. He would also buy twist chewing tobacco and, after finishing his chew, would set it on top of whatever fence post was handy. A few days in the sun to dry out and he’d put it into his tobacco pouch with whatever was in there “to stretch it out.”
I bought my first pipe (Dr Grabow) when I was 21 along with a pouch of Paladin. Between you the occasional Rum & Maple (when I could find it) and the everpresent cherry blends, I tasted the occasional higher end pipe tobacco and enjoyed it. That lead me to tryin cigars and JR Cigars after moving to North Carolina. The first exposure to pipes and cigars I had on the internet was through the JR Cigars forum.
The epic battles between the “herfer” and the “stokers” on that board lead me and a few others to break away and form Stokers’ Haven in Yahoo groups. Man! Those were some good times! I don’t know about anyone else, but I know I learned a lot about pipes and tobaccos there...as well as a lot about myself. I also got to know some fantastic people. Sometime around 2005 or 2006 I got a promotion at work that ended up taking up a LOT of my time and I turned Stokers’ Haven over to one of the other members there (I honestly can’t remember who) and took a hiatus from online forums.
Work continued and grew more complicated. I got better at it and took on more responsibilities. Lovely Wife’s career developed and we ended up moving to where we are now at the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains in Virginia just south of Roanoke. I smoked more cigars than pipes for convenience sake, but still kept pipes around and smoked them from time to time.
I’m still in the same position at work, but ten years has evolved it into something more manageable. We live on a sizable piece of land in the country where I am actively planting fruit trees and vegetable because it’s what I enjoy and I want to be as self sufficient as possible by the time I retire in 20-25 years. I am a licensed ham radio operator and now have room to put up antennas so I can indulge that interest as well. And...I still smoke my pipes. The good thing about switching mostly to cigars for all those years is that my pipe tobacco stash has aged nicely while it waits on me to get back to it.
I look forward to meeting the new people in the community here and reacquainting myself with those with more history. Thanks to those who have continued the legacy of providing a place for us “stokers” to gather.
Bryant/Yarnspinner68
Franklin County, VA
