Peterson spigot pipe

I first met Josh Burgess, Peterson's managing director, through a phone conversation several years ago when he was still at Smokingpipes.com. I was in the middle of teaching an 8th grade class and they’d just gone to their independent practice when he called in response to my answers on one of those "Survey Gorillas" that SPC sends out from time to time. If I remember correctly I was (for shame!) grousing about their perceived deficiencies where Peterson was concerned. Then as now, Josh was articulate, informed and erudite with an astounding amount of sensitivity and graciousness. But that didn't prevent us from really getting into it for about 30 minutes or so, as I received an education of the "business side" of our hobby and he got an earful of one hobbyist's views. I’m glad the school principal didn’t walk by and that my class was, for a bunch of 14-year-olds, fairly well-behaved, because I all but forgot I was at work. I remember being surprised that Josh would take so much time to talk to me. Only much later did it come to me that Smoking Pipes must take these surveys very seriously, since they felt the need to both acquire Peterson and then send Mr. Burgess over to be its Managing Director. Right? This time I got to write the survey questions and Josh got to answer them, and as I expected, you're in for a treat as he talks about his unusual road to Peterson, the new directions the company is taking, where it's been recently and where he sees it going. Your professional road to Dublin and current position as Managing Director of both Peterson and Smokingpipes.eu seem the epitome of Laudisi’s unorthodox and counter-intuitive way of doing things. I’ve heard you were raised on a farm, hold a Ph.D. and companion a fiercely Calvinist Scottish Terrier. Can all these things really be true? That’s the Reader’s Digest version, yes. I grew up on a farm in Winston County, north Alabama. Perhaps our biggest claim to fame is that when Alabama seceded from the Union in January of 1861, we, having no appetite for disunion, adopted the same logic and tried to secede from the state. I spent my summers working on the farm, which was hard work, of course. I hauled hay, built fences, and fed chickens. When I got my first summer job at the age of 16, I felt like I’d graduated to a life of ease. But it was a nice place to live and a nice way to grow up. I had a real fondness for livestock, so I spent most of my youth thinking I’d become a veterinarian. When I went off to college, I realized my talents lay elsewhere. I developed a passion for early American history. Being a bit obsessive, I decided that anything worth doing was worth overdoing and went on to the PhD program at the University of South Carolina. My intention was to study the…