http://www.tobacco.org/newsfeed/category/collectibles.rss Latest top tobacco news headlines en-us http://www.capemaycountyherald.com/article/antiques/swainton/80078-antiques %E2%80%94 collectors ask %E2%80%98gotta light%E2%80%99 http://tobacco.org/news/333139.html Called “vestas,” after a Roman goddess, pocket match safes held were designed to fit snugly in a pocket. Some were fitted with a ring, as two of them here, so they could be attached to a fob or a chatelaine. Once there was a romance about lighting someone’s cigarette: hands cupped around a flame, the electricity of a first touch. Even if you didn’t smoke, you carried a light. You never knew when someone might come up and ask you, “Gotta light?” It was a great icebreaker. In the realm of antiques, matches haven’t been around all that old, just about 150 years.. An English chemist, John Walker, created a concoction of antimony sulfide, potassium chlorate, starch and gum and coated the tips of wood splinters. He sold the first batch to a local lawyer, a Mr. Hixon, on April 7, 1877. Cape May County Herald Thu, 02 Feb 2012 05:00:00 GMT http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/08/magazine/who-made-that-matchbook.html?emc=tnt&tntemail1=y http://tobacco.org/news/331702.html No one knows what exactly prompted Joshua Pusey, a lawyer and the inventor of the modern toboggan, to patent a folded piece of cardboard carrying matches and a striker in 1892. Though legend suggests it had more to do with vanity than with safety. "I heard that he was a patent attorney and always wearing suits and vests," explains Mark Bean, president of the match division of New Hampshire's D. D. Bean & Sons Company, which has been in the trade since 1938. "And that the box of wooden matches was bulky and awkward to carry around." Pusey called his brainchild "flexibles" quite possibly because, unlike their predecessors, which smokers carried in silhouette-marring match safes, they slid into a dandy's pocket with nary a bump. His contraption soon caught the attention of a company called Diamond. In 1896 it purchased the patent for $4,000, thereby charting its course toward world matchbook domination. . . . As recent antismoking crusades have dried up the remaining ad business, today's beautifully designed books are often inspired by nostalgia (or branding, or a combination of the two). And the rest are plain, undecorated white. "There's an affiliation with smoking that's hard to avoid," says Chris Scherzinger, president of Jarden Home Brands, which bought Diamond in 2002. "Not that I have anything against smokers." PHILLUMENY 101 Monte Beauchamp, an art director and author of "Striking Images," a collection of matchbook-cover art, reflects on the hobby. Why did you become interested in matchbooks? New York Times Sun, 08 Jan 2012 05:00:00 GMT http://au.ibtimes.com/articles/275277/20120103/jerusalemites-gave-smoking-pipes-gifts-lovers-during.htm http://tobacco.org/news/331370.html A romantic inscription found on the ceramic mouthpiece of a tobacco pipe discovered during an ongoing archaeological excavation in the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem suggests the pipe was probably given as a gift to a lover. The Arabic inscription reads: "Heart is language for the lover", according to a statement released, on Sunday, by Dr. Kate Rafael of the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA). Dr. Rafael is leading the excavation of the site. The literal translation of the caption, however, means: "Love is language for the lovers". The pipe dates back to the Ottoman period, between the 16th and the 19th centuries, when clay pipes were very common and were mostly used for smoking tobacco. The Arabic inscription on the clay pipe reads: "Heart is language for the lover." Photo Credit: IAA Smoking was quite popular among both men and women in Jerusalem during the Ottoman rule. International Business Times Israel Tue, 03 Jan 2012 05:00:00 GMT http://opinion.inquirer.net/12483/cigarettes-and-filipino-nationalism http://tobacco.org/news/330619.html It is fascinating to trace present proposals for “sin taxes” on tobacco and alcohol back to their roots deep in the Spanish colonial period. For a comprehensive and readable study there is nothing better than Edilberto de Jesus’ “The Tobacco Monopoly: Bureaucratic Enterprise and Social Change, 1766-1880” (Ateneo de Manila University Press, 1980). That, however, is not the last word on the topic because one area remains unexplored and these are the various cigar and cigarette labels that were made in the Philippines from the late 19th century to the pre-war period. Hundreds of small mom-and-pop companies concentrated in Binondo packaged cigarettes with labels that deserve serious study because these are not just works of art but a mirror of the times. . . . I once collected Filipino cigarette labels, hoping to write a source book on early Philippine design, but when I was refused a feature in an inflight magazine on the basis of their no-smoking-in-the-cabin policy, I gave up and sold my collection. Quite sad really because today’s cigarette packages are not as aesthetic as the old ones. Vintage cigar and cigarette labels are visual fragments of Philippine history, taste and culture. Philippine Daily Inquirer Philippines Wed, 21 Sep 2011 04:00:00 GMT http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2011/sep/14/joe-rosson-value-of-smoking-paraphernalia-going/ http://tobacco.org/news/326232.html What this means is that in the collecting world, smoking paraphernalia is out. I called a fellow appraiser in New York last week to ask about a really nice 1920s cigarette holder and was told that it was virtually unsellable because the market is just not interested in smoking items. I am not sure whether or not this is true or if the appraiser was just so anti-smoking that she let her distaste color her judgment and distort her point of view. It is true that I see far less interest in good smoking pipes, cigarette holders, ash trays and humidors than I once did, but these objects do still sell — but at a reduced price. Knoxville News-Sentinel Thu, 15 Sep 2011 04:00:00 GMT http://www2.journalnow.com/lifestyles/2011/aug/28/wsliving03-reynolds-art-donation-has-good-bad-poin-ar-1334233/ http://tobacco.org/news/325504.html The Arts Council's announcement that it will sell 3,000 artworks recently donated by the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. amounts to a mixed blessing for the city's visual-arts community. . . . Thirty-seven of the works are up for auction through Sept. 9 and on exhibit through Sept. 24 in the Milton Rhodes Center for the Arts' Womble Carlyle Gallery. . . . Obviously, this is good for the Arts Council. So, why is it a mixed blessing? Because money that collectors spend on any of the donated art might otherwise be used to buy works from local galleries and studios. . . . While the council deliberates on how to spend its windfall, the show in the Womble Carlyle Gallery provides an intriguing glimpse of the art Reynolds has been collecting in the past several decades. Even if you lack the disposable income to bid on these works, you're likely to find something of aesthetic interest in this stylistically diverse show. Historically, it ranges from a 19th-century Romantic landscape painting by Consalvo Carelli to representational and abstract works made since 1970. The tobacco industry is visually represented in a few works, including George Harrington's "View of Hindale Smith's Tobacco Farm," painted in 1884, and Dennis Zaborowski's more recent photorealist still life, "Orange Ashtray." Admirers of meticulously rendered, nostalgic landscape imagery will gravitate toward works by William Mangum, Mac Powell and Joe Seme. Winston-Salem Journal Sun, 28 Aug 2011 04:00:00 GMT http://readingeagle.com/article.aspx?id=325430 http://tobacco.org/news/324640.html The Commonwealth Cooperative Association, a Socialist collective formed in 1898, made Karl Marx Cigars, according to labels on rare cigar boxes in the collection of Earl Ibach of Womelsdorf. Marx's portrait appears on the underside of the cigar box lid, above the label "Economist." Ibach, a cigar historian and author of "Tulpehocken Cigarama," said the Karl Marx label was made in Reading. Berks County historian George M. Meiser IX said they were made on the second floor of the Labor Lyceum Hall at 628 Walnut St., headquarters of Cigarworkers Local 236 of Reading. Ironically, Karl Marx Cigars sold for 5 cents, ostensibly fulfilling Vice President Thomas Riley Marshall's famous dictum - "What this country needs is a good five-cent cigar." Reading Eagle rdevlin@readingeagle.com ( Reading Eagle: Ron Devlin) Thu, 11 Aug 2011 04:00:00 GMT http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2011/0723/1224301182069.html http://tobacco.org/news/324011.html AN unusual gift presented to the wife of an American general by the Emperor of Japan after the second World War has unexpectedly turned up at an auction house in West Cork. Hegarty's fine art auctioneers in Bandon will tomorrow auction the oriental collection of the late Georgette Ellison, wife of a US General during post-war tours of duty in Asia. The most intriguing lot is a three-piece smoker's set in silver and lacquer presented to Mrs Ellison by Hirohito who reigned from 1926 to 1989 and is known, since his death in Japan, as the Emperor Showa. Irish Times newsdesk@irishtimes.com ( MICHAEL PARSONS) Ireland Sat, 23 Jul 2011 04:00:00 GMT http://dealnews.com/Coughing-Screaming-Lung-Ashtray-for-5-free-shipping/474434.html http://tobacco.org/news/322662.html CellularFactory offers the Coughing Screaming Lung Ashtray for $4.99. With free shipping via coupon code "IU8PQD", that's the lowest total price we could find by a buck. When a lit cigarette is placed on this ashtray, it starts coughing and screaming, replicating the reaction a smoker has when their doctors tell them the bad news. Deal ends June 27. DealNews.com brianm@dealnews.com Sat, 02 Jul 2011 04:00:00 GMT http://info.courtroomview.com/Blog/bid/58851/CVN-Introduces-Engle-Litigation-Trading-Cards http://tobacco.org/news/320931.html Last year CVN introduced the Engle Verdict Tracker. Now, CVN's Engle Litigation Trading Cards gather, analyze, and highlight even more key statistics to help evaluate the Tobacco Litigation outcomes. We hope our readers enjoy these trading cards, but we also expect that the cards will be used as serious information and planning tools by participants and observers alike. Baseball cards were originally distributed with cigarettes (not bubble gum), so we think it fitting that the original cigarette card be revived a century later, in the context of tobacco litigation, and with a baseball theme. Courtroom View Network Wed, 01 Jun 2011 04:00:00 GMT http://news-antique.com/?id=798481&keys=antique-auction-cigar-tobacco http://tobacco.org/news/320788.html A superb collection of early tobacciana will be smoking its way across the auction block on June 18 as Morphy’s presents a 900-lot Antique Advertising sale featuring the specialty collection of the Gotham Cigar Museum of Tampa, Florida. “It’s amazing how many different types of cigar-related items are sought after by collectors. This premier collection traces to the early days of the cigar industry in America and includes everything from cigar boxes to hand-painted cases to beautiful die-cuts and figural advertising pieces,” said Dan Morphy, owner of Morphy Auctions. In the 1990s, the owner of the featured collection became interested in the history of “clear” Havana cigars – those that were rolled in the United States in pre-embargo days (before 1963) using Cuban tobacco. . . . All forms of bidding will be available for Morphy’s June 18, 2011 Antique Advertising auction, including live at the gallery, phone, absentee, and live via the Internet through Morphy Live or LiveAuctioneers.com. News-Antique.com Mon, 30 May 2011 04:00:00 GMT http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-merseyside-13450315 http://tobacco.org/news/320372.html A cigar box once owned by the captain of the Titanic has been sold for £25,000 at an auction in Liverpool. The walnut humidor was discovered gathering dust on a bedroom cabinet in the Merseyside home of Hilary Mee. It was spotted by auctioneer John Crane when he was invited to value a number of antiques. Ms Mee said she had no idea the item was connected to the ill-fated vessel, even though it had been lying around her home for 20 years. BBC Online UK Thu, 19 May 2011 04:00:00 GMT http://www.lvrj.com/furniture_and_design/42844302.html?imw=Y http://tobacco.org/news/318752.html Smoking was an important part of the life of a well-to-do gentleman in the 19th century. A cigar after dinner was routine. Smoking paraphernalia was created not only to be useful but also to show off wealth. Collectors today still search for all kinds of tobacco-related items, although smoking has lost favor. Pipes, ashtrays, cigar holders, lighters, cigarette or cigar cases, cigarette or cigar boxes, cigarette dispensers and smoking stands are collected. Las Vegas Review-Journal webmaster@reviewjournal.com Tue, 12 Apr 2011 04:00:00 GMT http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-somerset-12859768 http://tobacco.org/news/317239.html A rare collection of cigarette cards is being sold at auction in South Somerset. The London Cigarette Card Company based in Somerton has 430 lots, including cards dating back to 1896. Some of the famous faces on sale include footballer Stanley Matthews, actress Marilyn Monroe and cartoon character Dan Dare. A series of cards featuring cricketers including WG Grace and AE Stoddart is estimated to fetch £3,000. Managing director Ian Laker said it was rare to find individual cards from the Wills' 50 Cricketers 1896 series, let alone a full set. BBC Online UK Sat, 26 Mar 2011 04:00:00 GMT http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2011/mar/17/no-butts-about-it-smoking-accessories-are-hot/ http://tobacco.org/news/316760.html In recent years, however, that has changed somewhat. In fact, as cigarette smoking has become less and less accepted on a societal level, items associated with smoking have become more and more interesting to collectors. I suppose that - on some level - many collectors may feel that cigarettes and the equipment associated with them have become somewhat "obsolete," and therefore, the paraphernalia associated with smoking is more intriguing. Years ago, I purchased an "Art Deco" style cigarette dispenser that had a hopper for cigarettes, and on the front, the face of a turbaned "flapper" style woman with pursed lips (there was a similar model with a Gypsy woman in a bejeweled turban). When a button was pushed a cigarette shot out through her lips making it look like she was about to light up. Knoxville News-Sentinel Thu, 17 Mar 2011 04:00:00 GMT