Dr Grabow Duke (filter) Unsmoked New Old Stock Sanitized & Waxed

Pricing & History

Sold for
Start Free Trial or Sign In to see what it's worth.
Sold Date
Source eBay

Dr Grabow Duke (filter) Unsmoked New Old Stock Sanitized & Waxed This is a Dr. Grabow Duke - unsmoked, new old stock. It is 5 1/4" long, 1" across the outside rim of the bowl and 1 1/4" deep. There are no teethmarks or chatter on the stem and no charring on the rim of the bowl. I list these pipes as used only because the Pipe Shop they came from closed in the 1950's which means they have been stored in boxes and knocked about for 60 years. I have completely cleaned, sanitized, oiled and waxed them. There may be some scratches or dings but these are well aged, unsmoked pipes. Dr. Grabow pipes are made from the same high quality Mediterranean stock as the high priced brands and having produced millions of pipes in over a century of operation, Dr. Grabow's set a standard. Always a good smoke, always a reasonable price. In my not so humble opinion, DG offers better smoking products at a reasonable price on a consistent basis then any other brand, regardless of Country of origin. The following information is reproduced with permission from the website of R J McKay, /lokomac8/grabow.htm The Dr. Grabow as an identifiable brand of pipes began in 1931, as the brainchild of Louis B. Linkman and Dr. Paul Grabow. Linkman was owner of M. Linkman & Co., which had been making pipes since 1892 under the MLC brand. The Grabow family history is that Linkman and Dr. Grabow used to meet for a smoke and bull session in Brown’s Drug Store in Lincoln Park. During one of their discussions, Linkman told Grabow he had an idea for a new line of innovative pipes, and he wanted to use Dr. Grabow’s name and endorsement. We don’t know Linkman’s new idea behind these pipes, but suspect it was the 2-scoop aluminum cleaner, featuring a saliva trap and a nicotine trap, which also functioned as a scraping tool to remove residue from the bowl. The Dr. Grabow pipe was only one of several pipe brands made at the Linkman plant on W. Fullerton Ave., but they must have earned the public’s approval, because a 1937 Linkman publication shows sales of their Dr. Grabow pipes increased by approximately 8-fold in their first six years. Dr. Grabow pipe sales continued to increase and in October of 1944, the Dr. Grabow Pipe Co. was formed and incorporated. Its founding incorporators included Richard J. Dean, Angelo Pinasco, and Harry A. Shapiro. The corporate address remained in the M. Linkman building on W. Fullerton. We have found no evidence showing that anyone other than M. Linkman produced the Dr. Grabow pipe for the Dr. Grabow Pipe Co. of Chicago. In February of 1953, the Dr. Grabow Pipe Co. filed corporate dissolution papers. The next month in March, Henry Leonard and Thomas of Greensboro, North Carolina announced they had acquired the Dr. Grabow and M. Linkman business. The Chicago factory continued to produce Dr. Grabow pipes for a few months until manufacturing equipment could be moved from Chicago to HL&T’s factory, Sparta Pipes, in Sparta, North Carolina. In December of 1953 the Dr. Grabow Pipe Co., corporation of Chicago finally dissolved. HL&T continued to produce the Dr. Grabow pipes under their previous model names for the first few years, but with new shapes HL&T had developed for their Royalton brand of pipes. By 1956, the Dr. Grabow Pipe Co. advertised their new line of Savoy pipes for $2.00, and throughout the rest of the 1950s and in the early 1960s the Dr. Grabow Pipe Co. announced new lines of pipes – the Riviera and Regal in 1957, the Starfire in 1958, the Viscount and Eldorado in 1961. Also during the 1950s, the Dr. Grabow Pipe Co. introduced their filtered Duke line of pipes using the new Duke paper filters. Sparta Pipes wasn’t the only factory involved in manufacturing Dr. Grabow pipes for HL&T. Until 1984, So La Res Spa of Livorno Italy produced “little” Dukes and Larks. Missouri Meerschaum produced Dr. Grabow corn cob pipes. Italian and Greek makers such as Gigi produced meerschaum lined Dr. Grabow pipes. In 1969, US Tobacco acquired Sparta Pipes and rights to Dr. Grabow. This acquisition infus... read more

Items in the Price Guide are obtained exclusively from licensors and partners solely for our members’ research needs.

Flag item for content or copyright

If this item contains incorrect or inappropriate information please contact us here to flag it for review.

If you are the originator/copyright holder of this photo/item and would prefer it be excluded from our community, contact us here for removal.