PROBABLY KIND OF TWEEDY

Five years ago I wrote about McClelland's red cake. No, not a disquisition about a famous desert made by a small tribe of Celtic Hobbits living in the hills of West Virginia, which is a marvelous area I have no inclination to ever visit, because it sounds exactly like 'Deliverance Country' and they probably play banjos there, but a tobacco that someone I have mercifully not seen in nearly five years was frantic to find. He was a remarkable cheapskate, refused to buy his smokeables locally, sneered at non-readers of the Wall Street Journal, and used McClelland's No. 5100 Red Cake in his own blend.

Other than his anti-social tendencies and nasty personal odour, he was an all-right guy.
I remember him fondly, like all pipe smokers who piss off-cigar freaks.
As well as his beer drinking habits.


There is something infinitely lovable about crusty old farts wearing tweed who growl at junior executives and stock traders, pinch pennies worse than my fellow Dutch, AND smoke a pipe.


There used to be many more of them. Back in the old days (before I was born), all educated American men aspired to that state. Their ideal life consisted of an easy chair in the spacious living room, a rug in front of that on which one girl child and one older boy child played with toy trucks, a dog, a cat, half a gold fish in a bowl, the trim young wife wearing a frilly apron in the kitchen preparing a nutritious tuna casserole from a recipe in a "womens magazine", and a brand new station wagon in the driveway of their palatial suburban mission style ranch single story dwelling, as was clearly visible through the huge picture window.

His feet were up on the ottoman, he wore tweed, and he smoked a pipe.

A few years later there was also a large teevee there.

By which time the rug had become shag.

At least, that is what the advertisements in many magazines of that age tell us, and in those times a good pipe, a carved marshbird painted semi-realistically, and a six pack of beer were essential for the tweed-coated gentlemen. This was years before crackling rosé ever became popular, and catalogues mentioned bell-bottoms, leisure suits, and paisley. A golden age.

And everywhere the sound of banjos ...

Anyhow. Back to the red cake. It was good stuff, and many pipe smokers liked it, especially hermits and crusty old men addicted to the phrase "back in my day ...". It's gone now, because McClelland hung up the towel.

That was five years ago. Since then a number of other companies have moved into the area left vacant, and produced some truly remarkable tobacco products to fill the void.
In particular, Sutliff and Cornell & Diehl.

[Description and reviews of most McClelland products here: Kansas City tobacco. Article about their closure (by Larry Wagner, from Tobacconist Magazine, May 1, 2018) reproduced here: End Of An Era.]


McClelland's 5100 Virginia was in fact a blending tobacco that Tad Gage used in Three Oaks, and probably Syrian Three Oaks, which sadly can no longer be had. There are still nearly two dozen tins of it in my bookshelves, and I'm holding on to it for dear life. Splendid tobacco. There's an article about Tad Gage on Smoking Pipes which comfirms that.
I have never met Tad Gage, but I've known him for years.
Whether he wears tweed or paisley is a mystery.
I believe he lives near banjos.
He has a dog.

TOBACCO INDEX


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