Cultivating the Inner Hillbilly Dadness

When I was a kid, dads smoked pipes. That's what my dad did, also my uncle and several of their friends. Anytime we went hunting, fishing, whatever, if it was outdoors, there was a pipe clenched in someone's teeth.

I don't smoke a pipe very often, it's usually just when on a camping trip and maybe every so often when puttering around the garage and working on boat projects, but when I do, it's almost always a corncob pipe. I've gotten pretty into the Missouri Meerschaum cobs. Especially the Rusticob versions by Aristocob. They're cheap, kinda purdy and quite nostalgic for me. As a kid, I would see the cheaper model MM pipes heaped in bins at tourist traps around the Lake of the Ozarks and the Branson strip, when visiting my grandmother for the summer. They were kitsch, but part of the Ozarks hillbilly persona.

Now that I'm a dad and I've been back in the Ozarks for over 20 years, part of that hillbilly thing has seeped back in somewhat, pushing the Florida boy aside. You can't spend 20 years in the woods, hills, streams and lakes around southwest Missouri and northwest Arkansas without putting a little banjo and mandolin in your heart and soul.

My recent acquisition: Aristocob Rusticob Great Dane Egg Straight

My current collection: The three on the left are from Aristocob, part of their Rusticob line. Top down, Great Dane Egg Straight in Caramel, Diplomat Apple Bent in Red, Country Gentleman Straight in Brown. On the right, two pipes directly from Missouri Meerschaum - The Dwarf Cobbit and a Country Gentleman Bent.