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Mr. Foote
I would like to take a minute to say goodbye to an old friend of Memphis Tobacco Bowl. Shelby Foote, writer, historian, Southern gentleman, passed away last night (June 27) at the age of 88. When I bought the Tobacco Bowl in 1999 I was excited about meeting Mr. Foote. The first time he called so that I could prepare his tobacco I had visions of him as a regular who would sit around to discuss both history and the day's events with all of us here around the Round Table. Not so. He came in, picked up his tobacco and then left. He didn't even pay - I mailed him an invoice. He'd been doing it that way for decades and I saw no reason to change his ways.
Eventually we worked up to the point where he may linger to discuss pipes and pipe tobacco. He was amused by the prices of high-end pipes today and talked of how extravagant it was for him to spend $75 on a pipe years and years ago. From time to time he would bring a pipe or two in to be repaired and he would always say he didn't know why he needed to get them fixed when he had hundreds more just like them at home. Many, he said, were sent to him by people he'd never met. Fans, admirers, fellow pipe smokers.
At one point I foolishly thought I could outsmart the old man. He called one day to request his tobacco and I offered to deliver it to him as I live in his neighborhood. I had visions of being invited into his study - his Sanctum sanctorum, his fortress of solitude - to discuss the weighty issues of writing, reading and history. Instead he thanked me kindly and told me where I could leave the package just outside the front door. He did wave to me from an upper window, however, as I was getting back into my car.
His tobacco was a blend of cube cut burley, latakia and perique with a mild aromatic mixed in. He would buy the components and blend them himself. Eventually I blended them, named it Shiloh, and have been selling it ever since. It is a pleasant smoke.
One of the few perks of working in retail is the people one gets to meet. It was my pleasure to meet one of such a stature. The world, and the South in particular, has lost another great man of letters. The Tobacco Bowl has lost a great friend.
Posted by Richard Alley at June 28, 2005 02:00 PM
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