The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1907-09-22
The Co ncob Pipe

did We ever notice." remarked the
man from Platte county who had just
become the proud possessor of four
brand new Missouri meerschaum"
pipes, ''that they amt night onto near
so many corn cobs smoked in Salt Lake
ez they ought to be?"
Nobody volunteering the result of
personal observations on this head, the
man from Missouri proceeded. TITS a
fact, though. 1 notice it nigh every
day. At first I reckons it's because a
remarkable number of people in Salt
Lake doan' smoke, nohow. but after
a while 1 notes that they's a heap o
briars and wooden pipes, but not many
con cObs engaged in the occupation of
tightening the burdens of mankind.
When I takes a look around I'm sur
prised 10 see that even the editors,
whose first and only true love the con-
cob used to be, is going back on their
old friends. That set me to thinkin',
for when an editor can smoke anything
in the pipe line worth more than five
cents, it's either too much prosperity
or a perversion o. taste. So I asts one
of 'em what for ne done give up the
co'ncob. Well, it's this way seize
when I first same here 1 smoked a
co'ncob all the time. I smoked up al
two dealers had and in an evil hour
was persuaded to buy a meerschOum
"Tain't,' sezae, because we all wanted
to quit smokin' the co'ncob, but we
Just naturally drifted out of the habit
cause half the time we couldn't get
'em when we wanted 'em-and they
never was displayed-and-well, we just
naturally drifted out of it
Them is bad signs" muttered the
Missourian, as he left the cigar store
* X X
But that man was only partially
right" said an old man who sal
smoking a stogy. He was right in
that the smoking of the 'co'ncob' pipes
in Salt Lake is not the universal prac-
tice. He would have been right in say
ing that people in irish communities dc
not smoke Dutch pipes. and Dutchmer
do not whet their teeth on dudeens. ]
have made some inquiry among dealers
about this business, and my inYeStiga-
ton shows that the sale of cOrncot
pipes is fair, although not large. The
fancy styles of the corncOb are almost
altogether absent from the showcases
which is probably just as well, for II
is an established fact that a COrnCOt
pipe with a lit of 'doojiggers' on it i:
a source of profanity, most scandalOus
in quality and most appalling in guam
tity. Few there are, perhaps, whC
have heard such real, downright cuss.
ing as are the outpourings of a hear
overlooking with bitterness and disap-
pointment, when an obstinate fancy
pipe and its triply obdurate fancy stem
are involved. 1t is worthy the atten-
ton Of the missionary who seeks tC
save the lost SOUL"
X X X
The Missourian had no cause to be
monstrously alarmed about the pipes
that come from his state or the number
Of people who smoke them in Salt
Lake; for if they don't smoke them il
Salt Lake, it is surely a fact that they
smoke them somewhere else-because
the corncob has reached the lands OF
the benevolently assimilated. At any
rate, they are selling more Missouri
corncob pipes than they ever did. II
may be interesting to the loyal son OF
Missouri to know that his state as
usual has far OutstTipped the other
states-and the world, for the matter OF
that-in the manufacture of con
cobs," Last year Missouri made &c.
206.954 COrnCOb pipes, complete with
stems. The value of this product was
S402, 513. In order to safeguard the
dealer extra stems are always included
I'm the boxes, for there is sure to be