Antique Store Find - Unopened 1.5 oz Tin Of Velvet

ghostsofpompeii

I'm always in the market for vintage tobacco tins, and although Velvet tins are fairly easy to find I recently located a real beauty. And best of all it's an unopened tin. I was curious if anyone here knows the approximate age of the tin. I figure it has to be at least somewhere in the 60s' or earlier because it doesn't have a bar code on the tin.

I also seem to recall either Matches860 or The Artful Codger mentioning the older blends being somewhat different - and actually better. So it had me wondering if this particular era of Velvet might have been the blend they were discussing. I'm debating on whether to crack open the tin and smoke it ... or simply leave it sealed as part of my tin collection. The quality of the smoke may determine it for me. If it taste exactly like modern Velvet, then I still have a small amount jarred up and I'll simply smoke that when I get a hankering for Velvet.

I've included a few pictures of the tin for identification purposes. I'm hoping someone here might have a few answers for me.

The side panel reads: The Pinkerton Tobacco Company Owensboro, Kentucky 42301 Subsidiary Of Liggett & Myers Incorporated

Not quite sure when zip codes were added to our addresses ... so that might keep it closer to the 60s' as opposed to much earlier.

Darmon

Google says zip codes where introduced in '63

jfreedy

@ghostsofpompeii

SMOKE IT, SMOKE IT, SMOKE IT!!! 

Life’s short, enjoy!

motie2

Amen, brother!

Kmhartle

I would guess early 60's based on the lid design and comparison to Prince Albert tins. The Prince Albert tins with that lid design were introduced in 1960 and zip codes added in 1963. I have a few Fred Dodge Tin books that I'll dig through to see if I can find a more accurate timeframe. Great find! 

Lutrasaurus

Nice! Artful Codger videos will help you narrow the time-frame of the tin.

ghostsofpompeii

Best part about it is the price was only $8.00

Oddjob27

Holy cow! What a find! That's awesome! I vote smoke it!

KA9FFJ

@ghostsofpompeii HOLY COW! GREAT FIND AT AN EVEN GREATER PRICE!
Assuming '65 as the year, you have almost a 55 year old blend there. I agree with @jfreedy... Enjoy, enjoy, enjoy!

riobrusa

SMOKE IT....SMOKE IT.....SMOKE IT...Don't stress yourself but save the tin.

jim102864

Life is too short to hoard tins!  Smoke it now!

PappyJoe

I would definitely open it and see what condition the tobacco was in. 
If you don't mind me asking, how did you determine it was an unopened tin? I've never smoked Velvet and while I've seen plenty of Prince Albert tins, I don't know how they were sealed.

ghostsofpompeii

@PappyJoe Going by what was listed on the tag. Plus the tin appears unopened and I can tell by the weight of the can it's full. There actually was another tin in the same booth with Prince Albert that was also in perfect conditioned and unopened, with the pocket knife offer on the back of the tin.

PappyJoe

@ghostsofpompeii - Cool. I saw one for Prince Albert at a junk shop a couple of years ago that was marked unopened and they were asking $35 for it. I shook the tin and you could hear the old dried tobacco shaking in it. Upon closer examination, the tin had been opened. I passed.

I've seen empty, rusted tobacco tins selling for more than that Velvet you got. Good Deal.

ghostsofpompeii

@PappyJoe I went back to that same antique store today and bought the unopened tin of Prince Albert. I'll photograph it later. It's the tin with the pocket knife offer on the back. I think that dates this tin back to about 1964 ... which is probably the same as the tin of Velvet.