The Tobacco Box, Jar, and Tin

The tobacco box, jar, and tin are the three main families of vessels in which pipe smokers stored their tobacco. The distinction arises from where each was used: the box was carried in a pocket, the jar sat on a shelf, and the tin came out of the shop as ready-made packaging. All three have retreated from everyday use, because none offered the airtightness needed to preserve tobacco's moisture over the long term. Today they are among the most crowded fields within the tobacco-accessory collecting known as tobacciana.

The Box: Tobacco Carried in the Pocket

The pocket box was the most personal piece of a pipe kit, but its repertoire of forms was narrow: in 18th-century England, the body was mostly round or oval, with the top and bottom surfaces kept nearly flat. The real difference lay in material: horn and lacquered iron were common, papier-mâché showier, and silver reserved for a narrow, wealthy circle. In the Netherlands and Germany, meanwhile, engraved brass and copper boxes with lids formed a distinct branch starting from the late 17th century. Records indicate that a brass souvenir box prepared for the 1851 Great Exhibition of London had separate compartments for tobacco, matches, and a clay pipe.

The genre's most celebrated example is not a single object but an accumulation. Henry Monck, in 1713, left a horn box to the society founded in Westminster by former parish overseers. A silver border was added to the lid in 1720; later generations continued this with silver plating, an embossed frame, and plaques each commemorating an event, with new casings commissioned as the box grew. The most debated is the plaque placed inside the lid in 1746, commemorating the Battle of Culloden and the Duke of Cumberland: 19th-century sources attribute the engraving to Hogarth, while the society's own history points to sculptor Henry Cheere (1703-1781), who worked in Westminster.

The box also had a public form: the "honour box" on the tavern table served both as a tobacco container and a piggy bank. A coin dropped through a slot in the lid released the inner catch, and the smoker took their share from the drawer themselves; a short verse on the lid served as a reminder to pay.

The Jar: Tobacco Kept on the Shelf

The jar carried no requirement of portability and therefore no weight limit; variety grew out of this. The earliest examples were domed-lid cylinders; in the 18th century, bodies carved from lignum vitae, lined inside with pottery or tin, with an outline recalling the period's pharmacy jars, became common. In the Netherlands, the tobacconist's shelf was filled with tin-glazed Delft jars, the blend name written on the body. The English firm founded by Josiah Wedgwood in 1759, meanwhile, produced its own jars in black basalt and blue jasper ware.

The center of the figural jar was Bohemia, today in western Czechia. In the late 19th and early 20th century, small workshops there cast terracotta and glazed vessels shaped as animals, children, human heads, and barrels; the most frequently cited producer is Johann Maresch, who worked in Aussig (today Ústí nad Labem). A porous piece that could be dampened was set into the lid; despite this piece, said to keep moisture balanced for a few days at the time, these vessels do not provide genuine humidity control by today's standards. The Martin Brothers workshop, operating in London from 1873 to 1914, is likewise known for its "Wally Bird" jars; the head of these grotesque bird figures, which correspond to no real species, is removed to open the tobacco compartment.

The Tin and What Came After

By the late 1800s, tobacco was largely sold by weight, and the bulk containers on the counter became the surface on which brand names first competed. The most sought-after series is the American Tobacco Company's 1912 Mayo Cut Plug "Roly Poly" tins: six round bodies, each depicting a different character, opened by removing the head section. Designed to fit a jacket pocket, the upright pocket tin, kidney-shaped in some examples, was among the metal containers that came closest to a standard. No firm date is given for its replacement by carton and paper packaging; the transition is estimated to have been completed in the late 1940s and early 1950s.

The glass jar was technically ready early: John Landis Mason's patent for a threaded mouth and screw-on metal lid was registered on November 30, 1858. Yet pipe smokers remained indifferent to this container for a long time; containers referred to as "humidors" were likewise not airtight, the name describing an aspiration rather than a function. Tobacco aging as understood today was not possible with this repertoire of containers; today's tobacco storage practice grew out of later glass and tin standards. The old containers, meanwhile, passed into the realm of collecting; the Society of Tobacco Jar Collectors, founded by Joe Horowitz in 1992, is the institutionalized form of this interest.