153. Documenting an English Peterson 359 System [3]
This very pristine and new-looking MADE IN ENGLAND dutch billiard System [3] 359 arrived at just the right moment in the spring of 2018, when I was scrambling to find appropriate illustrations for the introduction to The Peterson Pipe. At the time I was in a rush to get everything off to Briar Books Press, but I did document the pipe and some of its surprises, which I hope you'll enjoy. If you've got your book handy, take a look at the banner photo and see if you can date the pipe on your own. Spoilers ahead! Dating the Pipe 1937 is the earliest this 359 can have been made, simply because that’s the year the London factory opened. The catalog that was issued in that year shows the first part of the double-tiered taxonomy used to grade and number System pipes at that time: According to the catalog, in 1937 Systems you should be able to find bowls stamped De Luxe, 0, 2 and 3. What happened to “1,” you ask? There never was a “1” stamp, a bit of information found in the 1906 catalog. Still, that’s five grades of briar all told. Now here’s the next bit of confusion—and if you have your Peterson book handy, there’s a cross-reference numbering chart on p. 268 that helps. The bowls not only were graded by quality, but were also given three separate numbering systems. The Patent numbers (this bowl would have been the “Thinking Man” 4 shape) were given to De Luxe, First Quality (with no number stamp on the bowl) and “0” grade. These pipes, as the chart above shows, could be fitted with any of the four types of mouthpiece. The “2nd Grade” bowls (our Premier) were given the numbers Peterson currently employs for Standard and Premier. All clear so far? The “3rd Grade” were stamped with their own numbers. I don’t know if all the London-made Systems were stamped on the back of the stummel at the edge of the mortise, but the handful I’ve seen are. As Todd Becker’s Rogers Imports catalog shows, the three-tiered numbering for System pipes was still in place in 1939. By 1940, the five-tiered grading had been collapsed to just three, as you can see in the catalog page reproduced above: “De Luxe,” “System” and “0.” Not only that, but the three bowl numbering systems had been reduced to the now-familiar two, one for De Luxe and one for “System” [our Premier] and “0” [our Standard]. So: it is quite reasonable to conclude that this particular pipe was made between 1937 and 1945. The Ferrule As you can see, the nickel cap has been turned down to meet the bowl—a practice I’ve always admired, but one which Peterson abandoned sometime in the Dublin era (1991-2018), doubtless to economize. While nickel plate—which has always adorned the Standard System—can oxidize over time, it occurs so slowly that one doesn’t usually have a chance to observe tarnish spots…