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If you’ve not read Master of Pipes James Foster’s report of the Chicago Show at Pipesmagazine, this year’s show drew more than twice the crowd of last year, and the fun and number of tables and pipes could be seen. Nervous about the new book’s sales, I so rarely got up from our table to move around that I might not have brought home any souvenirs at all had it not been for friend Ken Sigel sitting on my right and Glen Whelan of Peterson sitting on my left. And I have never, ever, seen so many estate and new Petes at a Chicago show.  You pity me, right? Right?! C’mon guys.

(These were on the Danishpipes table across from us.)

Well, probably not, but it was crazy how many amazing Petes there were.  How did I see them if I couldn’t get away from the table? Three reasons:  Lance Dahl, James Walsh, and Dan Chasin.  About every 10 minutes one of them would walk up and say, “Hey, lookit what I found in the waste basket” (Dan) or “Mark, did you get any of those Silver Cap Naturals Glen Whelan was handing out gratis just a minute ago?” (Lance)  or, “Hey Mark, does Wal-Mart mind if I use their grocery cart for a bit? All these Petes are getting heavy!” (James).

But enough of them! They’ll be back in force next week with Ken Sigel to share out just a tiny fraction of the spectacular pipes they brought to the Pete Geek Meet.

Kevin Kilmer, Justin Feavel, Master of Pipes Tom Kuhn, and Adam Floyd

Gigi caught four Pete Geeks in a classic shot telling what the show is all about.  I want you to notice in particular the multi-generational nature of what pipe smoking is increasingly about. Kevin has clearly finished his verdict and is waiting for Tom to fact check by using the famous PPN blog.  While this is Justin’s first Chicago show he’s already got an amazing collection of 999s (see below) and like me is passionate about the 309 / 4s.  Tom Kuhn was awarded Master of Pipes at this year’s show and vlogs at Pipes, Tobacco & Whiskey, while Adam Floyd you know from his acclaimed Get Piped show as well as his own Peterson collection, which he brought with him to last year’s show.

Amu Torres

To me there is a very rare breed of people who come to to the show who aren’t simply fanatical hobbyists and not there to smile and sell widgets but who are there on behalf of the industry and yet somehow also wholly  passionate about pipes.  That would be people like Amu Torres, Mid-West sales rep for Laudisi Enterprises, whose infectious joy for pipes and for Peterson pipes is so great they wear it on their sleeve—as you can see here, in their rendition of the Sherlock Holmes Baker Street.  They’re a graduate of Moody Bible Institute (I subscribed to Moody Monthly all through high school), which I didn’t know when I met Amu, or I would’ve found a time to talk pipes and theology. I felt so honored they brought a Pete to show me—which I’ll show you in Part 2 next week.

Master of Pipes James Foster & cousin Carolina Henry

James Foster and Carolina Henry came by the table and chatted a bit, and as we got to talking he showed me his amazing Adam Davidson negative space bamboo blowfish, prompting Carolina to show off her blingy new Chris Asteriou. The photos I took were horrible, but if you come to the Texas Pipe Show November 14^th and 15^th in Midlothian, maybe they’ll bring them along.

Dan Butler “& Co.”

It’s impolite to call Dan’s beautiful wife “& Co.,” at least unless you’ve read Dickens’s Pickwick Papers and know that the wise and delightful Sam Weller always wanted to be an “& Co.”  Dan is a long-time PPN reader and 2025 marks his Chicago show debut as an artisan pipe maker.  He’s agreed to talk a bit more about his Peterson and pipe pilgrimage for an upcoming post.  In the meantime take a look at the pipe socks his bride knits! Dan told me she got her inspiration from the Peterson tweed pipe socks.

Kingfisher

If you’re at the smoking tent at just the right time, sometimes God shines down his light on you and you get to sample a really fine vintage tobacco.  This was the first time this ever happened to me, when a tin of really old Butera Kingfisher was opened. It was past midnight and I don’t even remember whose tin this was, but thank you for your generosity.  You may recognize from the tin shape that it was blended by J. F. Germain & Son for Mike Butera, a va/per as only that legendary house can make one. . . .

I didn’t get home with a photo of the tin (long story), but Todd Becker gifted me a 1970s tin of MacBaren Special Fine Cut, a straight virginia shag.  We popped it open and passed it around the table, and Andy Wike, who was sitting next to me, said said it smelled of brown sugar.  Once he said that, I could smell it, too.  It should make incredible hand-rolled cigarettes.  I know Sherlock Holmes smoked shag, but wow! It’s out of my wheelhouse insofar as packing a bowl with it.  Andy said it has to be packed really tight and sipped with great care.

Balancing the Peterson Moth

This is the only Peterson advertising moth I’ve seen in the wild, which is in the custodianship of Lance Dahl CPG.  We saw three of these in the Peterson Archive and they can be seen flitting in the big Peterson book if you know where to look (hint: Conor).  The moth has a small weight under the head which allows the moth to balance perfectly on the tip of your finger.  I never understood what it was for until Glen Whelan, who was standing at Lance’s table, explained its purpose.  “A salesman,” Glen said, “would place the moth on your finger, then explain that the felt weight of the System, when clenched, was just that light.”  That’s one of the great advantages of shapes like the oom paul—while the pipe might weigh 60 or 70 grams, the felt weight is much less due to the short moment arm of the stem.

Judy’s Ring

Judy stopped by the PPN tables to show me her Peterson ring and tell me its story.  She and her late husband, she said, visited the Sallynoggin factory many years ago, where they were taken on a tour by Tony Whelan, Sr.  They stopped to watch David Blake, who was silversmith at the time, turn down a silver mount.  She saw a sterling band with double beads on the floor, and picking it up, asked David if she might keep it as a souvenir.  He looked at it and said no, it was scratched, but then placed into her hand a new one. She took it home and had it filled with silver so she could wear it as a ring, which she does every time she comes to the Chicago show.

Best Dog on the Planet

I don’t know when the Chicago Pipe Show – Portillo’s Hog Dog connection began, but when Gigi and I first went to the show in 2011 it was already a tradition for a number of the faithful.  That was when the show was still being held in that mythical place called the Pheasant Run Resort (the kind of place you dream about), and if you walked out of the resort you could be to Portillo’s Hot Dogs in about 5 minutes.  I know there are those who turn up their nose and turn away with nausea at the thought of what W. C. Fields called “tube steaks,” and if they’ve never had a Portillo’s dog, maybe that’s why.  Chicago is famous for its pork, and these dogs simply pop in your mouth.  I’ve never found anything on the home market that tastes like them.  We went three times this year, even though it was a 15 minute drive.  I wish I could show you the lemon cake, but unless you had a piece, just like the dogs, you wouldn’t really understand what’s going on here.  All I can say is that when you next attend the Chicago show, if you go to Portillo’s with us, enlightenment will come.

Pipe Smokers of Ireland: “We few, we happy few…”

Left to right: Lance Dahl, James Walsh, Glen Whelan and Dan Chasin.  Collectively they’re sometimes known as the “Peterson Degenerates” (they’ve got an EP out on Spotify), but the Peterson world  thinks of them as leaders in the Pipe Smokers of Ireland Facebook group, moderated by Dan and Glen, and I’d have to leaders in the pipe world.

Here’s the thing about a pipe show. You can email and even text someone for years, but without the context of voice, body language, shared pipes, stories, jokes, hospitality, and a certain amount of aqua vitae, you don’t really begin to know them.  I was amazed by these guys and their life accomplishments, their kindness, generosity, and humor, not to mention the galaxy of Peterson knowledge they shared and the money they paid me to say this.

It’s an effort, especially if you’re at all introverted, to go to a pipe show and then extend yourself to sit at a table with people you hardly know, or may not know at all.  But as I found out with them, when you share pipes and pipe stories with each other, something incredible begins to happen. You find out you have far more in common than whatever differences you think you might have had.

Terry Carpenter is my proof text. Several years ago he and his wife Trease came and sat down at our table in the smoking tent. We were just there as anonymous show-goers and feeling more than a little awkward.  It wasn’t five minutes before he was sharing stories of his two careers in the world of Spy Vs. Spy (one in the public, one the private sector) as well as pipe lore, as he and I are great readers and always looking for a new pipe book.  This year, because we had a table, Gigi and I couldn’t share breakfast them as we have in years past, but we’re making plans for next year already.

The Celtic Sun Cross at Midnight

On the right is Tim Garrity, the President of the Chicago Pipe Club. Tim is Irish (of course!) and the Celtic cross around his neck, he told me, was his grandmother’s. It was 1:15am, Monday morning, and Tim had been quietly picking up the smoking tent for about an hour and a half. We had a photo taken to celebrate our heritage. It doesn’t get much better.

Alt.Smokers.Pipes Zippo

There was, when I first began looking for pipes and tobaccos, a usenet group called Alt.Smokers.Pipes. It was reading their posts that I came across what is widely regarded as the first mention of that impossible possibility, Pipe Acquisition Disorder.  You can find the documentation in my book The X Pipe, but it was a turning point for me, one that’s spiraled me down endless flights of the Scruples, even leading to this gag photo I made for my very first Chicago show:

I’m a very late-comer to the Zippo fold, but CPG Shimshon Cooke got me started after I had some difficulties getting my pipe lit outdoors at the Chicago show a few years back. I still don’t use one when I’m dealing with something like McClelland’s Dark Star, which required no end of flame before it’s really going, but what a Zippo loses in accuracy it gains in panache. I also like the smell and slight flavor of lighter fluid when I use it. Anyhow, this A.L.T. Zippo is in the care of my fellow philosopher Ken Sigel, who took most of the Patent era pipe photos in the new book. I wanted to return the favor here, with my best faux-Kodak Tri-X 400 shot:

Many thanks to everyone who made the Chicago 2025 show so incredible for Gigi and me. I’ll be back next week to celebrate the Petes I not only saw but was quick enough to photograph, including some mind-blowing pipes from the collections of Lance Dahl, Dan Chasin, James Walsh and Ken Sigel.

Justin Feavel CPG. Here’s a shot Justin sent me of just his 999s: