A lighting techinque you must try

Brothers of Briar

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Rob_In_MO":a81zvnu6 said:
monbla256":a81zvnu6 said:
I just light up something with Burley in it for that forrest fire experience :p
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So you want me to pick you up a couple ounces of 1-Q the next time I hit the B&M? :D
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OK, just go ahead and bomb Kyle with it for me will ya :p BTW re-label it "Smokers Delight" so he won't guess what it is :cheers:
 
I've never tried it. The descriptions and notes everyone has on it seem good, I just think it's too sweet for me.

I wonder what oak embers would do for it...
 
Kyle Weiss":fqbwr954 said:
I've never tried it. The descriptions and notes everyone has on it seem good, I just think it's too sweet for me.

I wonder what oak embers would do for it...
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That would probably work for those who can't do Latakia! Give it a Faux-Lat element to it! A true "woodsy, smokey" element :twisted:
 
Herment had a somewhat idiosyncratic style (and did not use little cartoon gloved hands saying "irony ahead"), but he was quite a manly fellow. In WWI he fought on the Eastern front, was captured by the Germans and imprisoned. He escaped and headed back to the front! I think this was repeated at least once. He was eventually banned from re-entering France until the war ended. So I'd cut the guy some slack. I enjoy his book, and had to buy another, having worn out my first copy.

Herment might be considered the P.J. Wodehouse of pipebook authors. You either appreciate wry humor or find it vaguely irritating. I think Hacker sometimes tries to imitate Herment's style, but it doesn't seem to flow naturally. It seems to be something Hacker might add on his second or third draft. JMHO offered with no clear evidence for support.

I've tried the Herment burning ember light and found it awkward to carry off without setting myself aflame. However, somewhere else in the book, Herment recommends taking a twig from the fire and ligting up with that, and also advises the use of a burning pine needle, of which my backyard provides a more than ample supply. A pipe lit with pine needles is quite nice.
 
I can see the titles of BoB's "Life Events" section now--

"I just burned down my house."

:|

Hobbyists are hilarious--we simply can't stay with anything functional and ordinary, can we? :lol:

8)
 
"I just burned down my house."


Granted this would be an undesirable life event, but I don't recall Herment suggesting that the ember should be selected and then transported inside the home by the piper for the lighting ceremony. No, I recall he consistently supported the woodsman's cautious practice of keeping campfire and embers safely outdoors, posing no threat to property, smoker, family or pets.
 
Kyle Weiss":0kq33aqb said:
I can see the titles of BoB's "Life Events" section now--

"I just burned down my house."
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I'm just glad that the hypothetical chap whose house burned used the proper grammatical construction. "I just burned my house down" would not be acceptable. After all, a preposition is a lousy part of speech to end a sentence with.

....

:mrgreen:
 
Ocelot55":0eu31rbt said:
Kyle Weiss":0eu31rbt said:
I can see the titles of BoB's "Life Events" section now--

"I just burned down my house."
Click to expand...
I'm just glad that the hypothetical chap whose house burned used the proper grammatical construction. "I just burned my house down" would not be acceptable. After all, a preposition is a lousy part of speech to end a sentence with.
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:cheers:
 
"Down was where was my house be at, and damn lookit'er go on burnin' like a fat squirrel on a spitrod!" :cyclops:

 
TheSmokeamater":3kltxavy said:
From the sometimes profound, often absurd, always entertaining 1953 book, The Pipe, by Georges Herment:

Part 3: Lighting the pipe; What Shall we use?
".....an ember from a wood fire deserves a paragraph all to itself.
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A cockamamie idea? It sure sounds like one. However, I can tell you have tried this a few times. It is everything he says, and more. Although I don't recommend pressing your thumb into a red hot burning ember!!
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I ran across this when looking for stems for clay pipes
http://jas-townsend.com/product_info.php?cPath=50&products_id=1234
Although in the living history world it's known that just because a sutler sells something doesn't mean it has basis in history I'm going to assume that this particular item does have historical precedent.

At our first reenactment this year I realized a couple things. First, I had only brought with me 2 tin match carriers and that I was going to go through a lot more lucifers (matches) than I had with me. Second, in period they wouldn't likely have had all that many and would have utilized the fire for lighting of their tobacco. Third I could use my Barstow County Yankee Killer knife (actual unit and 3 brothers are shown in a well-known photo holding large bowie knives) to split off spills (thin paper or wood fire transfer tool) from the cedar shingles I had for kindling. I definitely got a dose of cedar smoke occasionally when lighting up but I had a lot longer time to get the weed going before the flames threatened my fingers.
 
Lesepfeife":c6b31ccx said:
TheSmokeamater":c6b31ccx said:
From the sometimes profound, often absurd, always entertaining 1953 book, The Pipe, by Georges Herment:

Part 3: Lighting the pipe; What Shall we use?
".....an ember from a wood fire deserves a paragraph all to itself.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A cockamamie idea? It sure sounds like one. However, I can tell you have tried this a few times. It is everything he says, and more. Although I don't recommend pressing your thumb into a red hot burning ember!!
Click to expand...
I ran across this when looking for stems for clay pipes
http://jas-townsend.com/product_info.php?cPath=50&products_id=1234
Although in the living history world it's known that just because a sutler sells something doesn't mean it has basis in history I'm going to assume that this particular item does have historical precedent.

At our first reenactment this year I realized a couple things. First, I had only brought with me 2 tin match carriers and that I was going to go through a lot more lucifers (matches) than I had with me. Second, in period they wouldn't likely have had all that many and would have utilized the fire for lighting of their tobacco. Third I could use my Barstow County Yankee Killer knife (actual unit and 3 brothers are shown in a well-known photo holding large bowie knives) to split off spills (thin paper or wood fire transfer tool) from the cedar shingles I had for kindling. I definitely got a dose of cedar smoke occasionally when lighting up but I had a lot longer time to get the weed going before the flames threatened my fingers.
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Thank you for your contribution to this thread.

When used the lighting method Herment described, I used the point of a knife to pry an approximately a quarter inch square ember off a burning log in a wood stove. I then carefully placed said ember atop the tobacco in a freshly packed pipe. I enjoyed the bowl to the bottom with no re-lights and very little tamping.
 
I have Herments book and enjoyed reading it. There was several things though that had me scratching my head and muttering 'huh".
 
The ember tongs I have are only about 3 inches long and have little cups on the ends to hold the coal. They have been in my wifes family since at least the 1880's. I will have to try and find them to get a picture.

Jim
 
KevinM":3qtikn0q said:
Herment had a somewhat idiosyncratic style (and did not use little cartoon gloved hands saying "irony ahead"), but he was quite a manly fellow. In WWI he fought on the Eastern front, was captured by the Germans and imprisoned. He escaped and headed back to the front! I think this was repeated at least once. He was eventually banned from re-entering France until the war ended. So I'd cut the guy some slack. I enjoy his book, and had to buy another, having worn out my first copy.

Herment might be considered the P.J. Wodehouse of pipebook authors. You either appreciate wry humor or find it vaguely irritating. I think Hacker sometimes tries to imitate Herment's style, but it doesn't seem to flow naturally. It seems to be something Hacker might add on his second or third draft. JMHO offered with no clear evidence for support.
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As a "younger" old guy, I find myself becoming less susceptible to the "old guy" humor...."Yeah. just press that coal down into your pipe with yer thumb....".

Reminds me of a stop I made at a "smoke" shop to pick up a couple of pipe nails. The guy behind the counter, smoking a cigarette, says, "Pipe Nail???...Wah. usually just tamp it down with my thumb!"
I explained that as his thumb was only sporadically available to me, and seldom at the time I needed to tamp my pipe and given that temperatures in pipes have been recorded as high as about 500 degrees F, I would like to purchase 2 pipe nails rather than the 2 of us standing across his counter waggling our peckers over our heads at one another.
 
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