296. SPECIAL BULLETIN: The POY 2022 / 14B Drops Soon!
Rev. 08/28/2022
As life-long Pete Geek Jørgen Jensen likes to tease me about the length of my posts, “Buy a Peterson, write a novel.” This is one of those posts, so you may want to put a fresh pot of coffee on and refill your pipe, because the 2022 Pipe of the Year is about to debut and there’s a lot to say. We’ve got samples of the pipe to look at, words from Peterson’s Pipe Specialist Giacomo Penzo on the challenges of its creation, and its long and storied history to explore! So pour a fresh cup of coffee and light up your favorite Pete—!
If you ask a long-time Pete Geek what the most desirable, no longer made System shape is, he’ll undoubtedly say the 308. It was known as shape 14 in the 1896 catalog and made famous by the 14B Mark Twain smoked, which was donated by his daughter Suzie to the Boyhood Home and Museum in Hannibal, Missouri. 1 Twain had been a System devotee since at least 1895 and maybe before that, owning several different System pipes which you can read about in Post #239.
POY 2022 / 14B in the Heritage finish (outdoor lighting)
THE DROP
Before going any further, let me give you what I know so far about the drop:
Smokingpipes.com: Wednesday, August 17th at 6pm EDT.
Smokingpipes.eu: Tuesday, August 16th at 10am (US readers, that’s IDT or GMT+1 or here in the US 5am EDT, 4am CDT and 3am PDT).
Worldwide availability through other internet and brick & mortar retailers will follow.
FINISHES
The US site will include three Sandblasted Supremes, a few Silver Caps (Rusticated and one in Terracotta), a few Rua Sandblasts (remember the Rua is PSB grade) and a few Ebony. As always, the greater number will be divided between Terracotta, Heritage, Sandblast and Rusticated. No Naturals at the US site.
The Dublin site will includes a few Naturals plus a few Silver Cap Rusticated and the remainder in Terracotta, Heritage, Sandblast and Rusticated. I haven’t heard whether there will be any Ruas or Supremes on offer.
If you can’t make the Drop Party at either site, do keep in mind that Laudisi has clients all over the world who will stock the POY 2022 in just a short time on on their virtual or real shelves.
POY 2022 / 14B in Rua PSB-grade contrast stain (outdoor lighting)
MEASUREMENTS & OTHER DETAILS (Heritage sample)
Length: 6.0 in / 152.4 mm
Weight: 2.35 oz./ 66 g
Bowl Height: 1.88 in / 47.8 mm
Chamber Depth: 1.50 in / 38.2 mm
Chamber Diameter: 0.76 in /19.5 mm
Outside Diameter: 1.57 in / 40 mm
Stem: B (tapered) Vulcanite P-Lip with tenon extension
Shape: “Ball” in the 1906 catalog
Finish: Smooth, sandblast, rusticated
Hallmark: L for 2022
Era: Laudisi (2018 – )
Numbered: 1/925 through 925/925
“Chat With A Smoker” POY 2022 special pipe box brochure
The pipe will include a new “Chat with the Smoker” brochure specific to the 14B release in a suede leather pipe sock and the high-grade box. The “Chat” brochure honors K&P’s long history of such brochures and was brought back with the John Bull / 999 homage, the first of Laudisi – Peterson’s POYs in 2019.
GIACOMO PENZO ON MAKING THE POY 2022
I asked Peterson’s Pipe Specialist Giacomo Penzo to share his thoughts on the making of the POY 2022. His insights as the lead designer and as an artisan pipe maker in his own right give us a context for understanding the importance of the project, its achievement and the commitment of Laudisi-era K&P to the company’s long history.
This has been an important project for us and perhaps the most difficult we’ve undertaken since I came to work for Peterson. When we first began to think about the POY 2022 several months ago, we considered a number of different shapes, all of them interesting. In the end we decided on the 14B as a tribute to Mark Twain, the American writer, as a way of offering the Peterson collector one of the most admired shapes that’s ever been made by the company and one that was there at the very beginning.
The shape of the14B differs somewhat depending on which of the old catalog illustrations you’re looking at. The most recent version—the Mark Twain pipe from 1981— was too large and quite different from the original, which is very egg-like in shape, short, compact and quite eye-catching. We knew its full-bent shank wouldn’t permit any mistakes if we were to obtain the correct System engineering.
Every professional pipe maker knows there a huge difference between a two-dimensional drawing or illustration and a three-dimensional rendering of it. There’s not a direct route to recreating the sensations evoked in the catalog illustrations, so we knew that just making one sample bowl wouldn’t be enough. In the end, I made up four samples in our search for the exact shape, lines, bend and proportions we felt embodied the original 14B.
After making up the sample bowls, the team worked with Glen Whelan studying them and comparing them with the old drawings before the team gave their approval to what would be the actual shape.
All the mouthpieces on this year’s POY were shaped by hand on the lathe. It was a huge undertaking, but we wanting the best possible stem. All the craftsmen and women were really proud of their work on the final pipes. While it was a big challenge, it was also a great learning experience and a lot of fun.
I hope Peterson collectors and smokers will find it as enjoyable to smoke it as we did to make it!
BACK STORY
To really grasp the beauty and achievement of this year’s POY, I think it’s crucial to know its pedigree, beginning with the original Patent-era pipe which it so wonderfully embodies.
Shape 14 originated as part of the group of Charles Peterson’s “Ball or Round-Shaped Bowls” in the 1896 catalog, shapes 13 – 21, of which only the 20 (314 in Standard) currently remains in production.
The 14B from the 1906 catalog
Contemporary interest in the shape began in the late 1970s when Bill Sweeney, the director of the Peterson-owned US distribution company Associated Imports, visited the Mark Twain Boyhood Home & Museum in Hannibal, Missouri on a family vacation. The holiday was interrupted when Sweeny saw what was undoubtedly a Patent System, albeit a badly abused one, in one of the displays. Explaining his credentials, he asked to look more closely at the pipe. He called K&P and in short order they sent a few guys over to measure the pipe to create the 1981 Mark Twain Commemorative.
Twain’s 14B (HM 1896) at the museum
(If you sent this photo to me, let me know so I can give you credit!)
There seems to be a bit of spin about the story, and while I know the Peterson guys did come over and take a look at the pipe, I’ve always wondered why they didn’t just trust Sweeney do the measurements. The company was pretty flush in those days, but maybe everyone just needed a holiday. It’s also curious that they didn’t open up the 1906 catalog—they had two, evidence suggests—and take the measurements for themselves. It’s quite conceivable they just didn’t know where the catalogs were in all the boxes moved in 1972 from the old St. Stephens Green factory to the new Peterson House factory.
The 1981 MT
The important thing for us was that the MT was issued in 1981 and became the most popular Peterson commemorative ever. It was the first big pipe purchase I ever made at $65 and I couldn’t have done it if my best friend (who already had one) hadn’t paid for half of it as a birthday present (“my preciouuuussss”). The brick & mortars who carried Petes all the wonderful strut card of Twain jointly issued by A. C. Petersen tobaccos and K&P:
While the MT bears a really strong family resemblance to the original Patent shape and is wholly saturated with house style, the bowl wasn’t quite the 14B, however wonderful in all other respects. The height had been shortened a bit, probably due to a miscalculation (look at the damage of the museum pipe). It also lacks the amazing cheeking (roundness) of the original Patent shape, perhaps because there were no 14 shapes in the factory to check it against. Who knows?
The MT effectively put Peterson on the map—again—for many US pipe smokers. I’ve heard some old-timers say that back in the 1970s Petes were seen as “blue collar” pipes, and I sort of get that, although going back just a few years to the 1950s and 60s, Rogers Imports had certainly elevated the brand’s status in the US to the equal of many others. In any event, the MT was so successful for K&P that it was released re-released a number of times in the 1980s and then again during the Dublin Era as part of a set which included the fantastic D19 / Large Tank (sadly no longer available).
Fully half of the MT’s success had to do with the tapered stem, which had last been seen on System pipes in the 1948 distributor’s catalog:
1948 Distributor’s Catalog (detail of Deluxe B shapes)
The other part of the MT’s success had to do with Twain himself, who was undergoing a renaissance of interest at the time in great part owing to the Hal Holbrook’s one-man play Mark Twain Tonight! which older Pete Geeks may recall. Yet what sealed the pipe’s reputation forever afterwards was word of mouth: it was, and is, a great smoker. Virginia smokers in particular praised it for that reason (and still do).
14B from the 1896 catalog
The original 1896 version of the 14B, seen above from the 1896 catalog, is the one preserved at the museum, as was confirmed in photos of Twain’s pipe sent to me by the museum’s director when writing the big Pete book: the pipe is hallmarked the “A” for 1896.
c. 1925 detail from the Phillipp Weiss & Söhn, Vienna brochure
The next appearance of the shape I have on record is from the mid-1920s, in a wonderful tri-fold brochure from Charles Peterson’s friend and distributor in Vienna, Phillipp Weiss. I call this engraving the “14 Doughnuts” version. It’s really fun and the illustrator captures the rotundness of the shape, although the airway drilling appears to be impossible and somehow I suspect the real-life shape didn’t change didn’t this much from the 1906 photo-lithograph to the 1920s!
1937 14B and 308 / 358
Next the shape appears twice in the 1937 catalog. These aren’t really very useful as the 14B is tilted toward the viewer and the front descending bowl line of the 308 / 358 (Premier and Standard qualities) seems not to be drafted very well.
A 14S, c. 1955 (Josh Burgess Collection)
No one I know has actually seen a 14B in the wild, although I do know of one 14S, in the collection of Managing Director Josh Burgess. This one is a honey. The thinnness of the saddle shank is due to the fact that it’s a hand cut stem. But you really get a good feel for what the shape is all about here.
308 Premier stamped “For Shannon Airport”
What most aficionados of vintage Petes have known and loved over the past many decades is the 308 Premier and Standard domed mount version of the 14. I don’t think any of us even suspected over the years that it was the same shape as Twain’s. Most of us didn’t even know there was a shape 14!
308 Standard
I have two 308s, a “Made for Shannon Airport” Premier and a Standard and both are exceptional, fully as good as my MT. The reservoirs on these are simply caverns, with a kind of open, full drilling that makes me understand why the ferrules were necessary in the first place. Whoever drilled those had to be really careful, and I’m sure more than one stummel was destroyed in the process.
The acquisition of the European Dublin & London catalog from 1955 not long before we finished the big book solved a lot of dating problems for the 14 and other B-stemmed Deluxe pipes thanks to pages like this one:
From 1955 Dublin & London Catalog
The Shannon Premier, for example, can’t be dated prior to 1955, since that’s when the export booths at the Shannon Airport first opened. The catalog also contains the last reference in K&P printed ephemera to shape 14. As you can see, while it was available when the catalog was first issued (c. 1955), not long after it was discontinued—a short enough time to justify using a purple DISCONTINUED stamp across shapes no longer available.
While I normally don’t include an entire catalog page to avoid visual distractions, this page is instructive in two particular regards. First, while the 14B was gone by 1955, the 4B, 9B and 11B were still available. I’ve never seen any of these apart from a single 4B on the estate market, which made the Nassau ‘Ulysses’ 9B all the more welcome last month. Second, while these B stems are heavier and thicker than the 1906 version appears, I suspect this was a necessary progression of Charles Peterson’s aesthetic to accommodate wear on the P-Lip button.
In any event, tapered stems simply dropped out of fashion in the years from 1948 to 1955, as can be seen in the 1955 Dublin & London catalog. Fashionable pipes were straight, without bands, and increasingly had very thin saddle stems. So completely did this mind-set take over that when the MT arrived it hit us like something out of the remote past, when as we now know it had only been gone for a little over twenty years. Let’s fast-forward to 2022.
A CLOSE LOOK AT THE POY 2022
I’ve purposely photographed the POY from a horizontal rim flank to allow you a better understanding of it in comparison with the historical examples and illustrations of the 14 seen above.
POY 2022 / 14B in sandblast (outdoor lighting)
Remember as we’ve explored in earlier posts that several shapes changed a bit over the decades—the 9, the 11 and the 120 to name three, usually going for a heavier, more muscular aesthetic. The 14 didn’t go through these big changes, I suspect, because it was already there.
There are only two small differences I can find in comparison with my 308s from the 1950s. The first is a slightly shorter line down from the back of the crown to the top of the shank, which may have occurred as part of a shape shift in the 1937 catalog (when the 9 and the 11 both changed).
The second difference is the POY’s Patent-era ‘cheekiness.’ It’s got far more character in this regard than the MT and cleaner and perhaps a bit less bloated (in my opinion) than the 1937 – 1955 version. Take a look at the several gallery photos here taken from the Heritage version, which allows us to really see the lines of the the POY’s accomplishment:
Moving on to the stem, in the series of photos taken of Mark Twain between 1899 to 1906 on his return to the US (which you can see in Post #239), we can see that the humorist owned a number of Patent System shapes, some with tapered B stems (Deluxe tapered), some with A stems (Deluxe saddle) and some with the AB (tapered army mount). The way he chewed the buttons, it’s often difficult to know whether they were fitted with 1891, 1894 or 1898 stems.
But here’s the thing: as much a devotee of historical accuracy as I am, I do draw the line in eschewing anything prior to the 1898 P-Lip button. What’s the point? I’d much rather have a pipe with the complete Charles Peterson System intact. The P-Lip, as Shane Ireland told me in a forthcoming interview with him, is the most comfortable button ever created for a pipe. Whether you’re clenching to free your hands or simply cradling the pipe, it’s superb.
The bend of the POY reminds me of the great bend of the MT. As you can see in the clench-horizontal photos above, this gives the rim just a little bit of drop to make for easier clenching while not obscuring the chamber during lighting and smoking. There may be slight variation in bends between the different pipes in this release, which has become the norm in the Laudisi era. If you’re a clencher, look for a deeper bend. If not, no worries, right?
POY 2022 Rusticated
“Mind the Gap.” The gap in the stems of the samples is also worth noting. Josh Burgess told me, “We worked to recapture the early Patent feel of the pipe, and one of those elements was to narrow the wear gap. In more modern Deluxe Systems, that gap is wider and has been so for quite a long time.” I find this closer gap aesthetically more pleasing than that found on the MT and on all Deluxe Systems seen from about the Early Republic era onward.
The reservoir is really deep, the mortise being drilled out in three stages as was done on last year’s POY 4AB and is found as one of the handful of drilling styles on System pipes over their long history. It looks to me as if, just as on last year’s POY, I’ll have to use a doubled pipe cleaner to get to the bottom, as my usual twist of tissue probably won’t make it that far.
If you refer back to the measurements at the top of the post, you’ll see that at a 2 : 1 depth by width chamber geometry, Shape 14 has one of those classic chamber sizes so often overlooked nowadays by artisans and factories alike. It’s not made for a single tobacco style but will readily accommodating any blend, from the most demanding virginias to the easiest and most forgiving English. This geometry (similar to the 4AB’s) has been used in a number of the great Pete shapes, more perhaps than from other marques, and I confess it’s one I always look for as a virginia smoker.
The stamps are gathered together, as you can see in the detail above. Take a look also at the numbering of the pipes: 925. What a great number to choose, celebrating (of course) the .925 sterling purity mark on the band which has been used since 2003. The hallmark, L, is for 2022.
Can you believe it? A System with the Rua contrast stain!
In conclusion, the POY 2022 is everything we’ve come to expect and love from Giacomo Penzo and his creative team—which includes Josh Burgess, Glen Whelan and Jonathan Fields—the engineering is absolutely top-drawer, the aesthetic is fantastic, the authenticity undeniable. Pete heaven.
The POY is being offered in every possible finish, putting it well within the reach of nearly any Pete Geek. In addition to the Rua seen above (my dream POY 2022), I’m hoping to find a really nice Terracotta. What about you?
QUICK REFERENCE
Pipe of the Year (1997 –) Stamped sterling-mount limited edition 1997 – 2016. Collectible pipes, usually XL in size and unique in shape each year. Initially in smooth numbered edition of 1000. In 1997 with gold-plate sterling band. Vulcanite mouthpiece until 2014 (acrylic only). F/T in all years except P-Lip in 1999, BLANK and BLANK. In 2000, issued as two-pipe set with custom rack available. First four years lack year stamp; thereafter appearing as y (and date) over limited edition over number. Same shape issued as Pipe of the Year but without number stamping in sandblast finish, 1997–2014. To celebrate 150th anniversary, in 2015 POY issued in 1865 in smooth, sandblast or rustic, all numbered, to celebrate 150th anniversary. Run dropped to 500 smooth numbered pipes for 2016–18. In 2017, LE designation was dropped. The LE / POY stamps replaced by laser engraving 2015–18. Hand stamping resumed in ’19. In 2019, POY first issued in natural (numbered 1–10) with vulcanite P-Lip and run returned to 1000 pieces total. In 2020 and 2021, issued in 400 numbered pipes total. In 2022, 925 pipes were issued.
Many thanks to Josh Burgess, Giacomo Penzo,
Andy Wike and the crew at Kapp & Peterson
1 I’m not discounting the wild popularity of the 4AB, but that pipe had not been around since the early 1940s nor seen on the estate market until it appeared as last year’s POY. And, for those reading this, I was recently told by K&P that while they might be interested in reintroducing the shape at some point, there are no plans at the present for doing so.