There is a contemporary news article on the factory published in the Richmond Times-Dispatch, April 21, 1946. A History of Appomattox, Virginia, published 1948, states, The Akron Pipe Factory of Pamplin holds the title of manufacturing the finest clay smoking pipes in the world, known as the ‘Powhatan’ (Featherstone, 1948:44).
In a personal letter to the writers, John C. Ewers said, “During my field work on the Fort Peck Reservation in Montana, in 1953, I first learned of the Pamplin clay pipes. One of my Indian informants told me about selling them when he was working at a trading post on the reservation during the first decade of the present century....
“Later I visited the trading post at Oswego on the Fort Peck Reservation. There the proprietor showed me the illustrated price list of the Pamplin Smoking Pipe and Manufacturing Company, Inc. He showed me the only type of pipe he still had in stock—the ‘Century of Progress’, Chicago type ([Plate 23] AJ). He said the manufacturer wrote him in 1951 that he planned to go back into the manufacture of the other styles, which the Assiniboine preferred.”
The Tomahawk pipe was a good specialty item for sale at such events as fairs and expositions, and the Company’s sales to the “Century of Progress” in Chicago in 1933 must have been excellent, even though they had not sold all they had made in anticipation of that demand. The bowl, necessarily narrow and elongated since it was in the blade of the tomahawk, did not recommend it to serious smokers, nor to the Assiniboine.
It would seem evident that these pipes were left over from the production of the Company in 1933, that their regular pipe models had by this time been sold out, and that the Company was already in a State of quiescence in 1951.
Dr. Clyde G. O’Brien of Appomattox stated that the Company ceased operations in 1951.
The Charter of the Pamplin Smoking Pipe and Manufacturing Company shows that it was incorporated by the Commonwealth of Virginia on the 15th day of August, 1929. The officers at that time were, J. V. Lewis, Pres., Prospect, Virginia; J. W. Franklin, V.Pres., Pamplin; L. N. Ligon, V.Pres., Pamplin; T. R. Pugh, Secy-Treas., Pamplin.
The purposes of the Company then were, among other things, to deal in wood of all kinds, own timber lands, contract to do construction work, deal in real estate, and to buy and sell all kinds of necessary material ... and operate all the necessary equipment and machinery for the purpose of manufacturing clay pipes, crocks, and earthenware.... (Charter Book No. 1, Page 108, Appomattox County, Virginia). The corporation (Charter No. 34565-16) was dissolved by the State Corporation Commission, at the request of the stockholders, on February 21, 1952.
A personal communication, February 23, 1972, from Morton L. Wallerstein who with Ralph L. Dombrower as corporate officers were the last active operators of the pipe factory, states, “Mr. Dombrower and myself, as sole stockholders, started the operation in 1938 and baked the clay pipes up to the time of the enactment of the Minimum Wage Law by Congress. At that time it was apparent that the part-time workers, largely farm girls and boys who worked in the afternoon, would cease to be employed because the pipes could not be marketed under the wages required to be paid.
“However, Mrs. Betty Price and another woman made the hand-made clay pipes at their homes, which pipes Mr. Dombrower bought after 1938 and very cleverly boxed in antique fashion and sold them for some years. However, unfortunately the women who made these pipes died and they were no longer made.