Dunhill's Long-Shank Canadian Pipes: ES, ODA 850, and 851

Dunhill's long-shank Canadian pipes appear in the brand's old shape chart under the letters ES, and in the postwar ODA line under the numbers 850 and 851. All three pair a slender, oval-sectioned, elongated shank with a mid-sized bowl, and at a glance they are difficult to tell apart.

What sets this trio apart in the collecting literature, though, is not their resemblance to one another but the fact that each of the three codes has a rare variant with a shank far longer than its usual measurement.

What Distinguishes the Three Codes

On a standard ES, the shank runs roughly seven and a half centimeters from the back of the bowl to where the mouthpiece begins, and the mouthpiece itself has a flattened oval section. On the 850 and 851, by contrast, the shank starts thicker at the bowl and tapers toward the mouthpiece, and both have a tapered oval mouthpiece. The 851's mouthpiece is noticeably long, which lengthens the pipe overall: a 1963 Shell 851 measures over 19 centimeters, while a 1964 Root Briar 850 comes in at roughly 16.6 centimeters. The 851 is rare in any finish. The 845, the series' third Canadian, is the most commonly encountered Canadian in the ODA line and is genuinely large-bowled; its shank typically runs between seven and eight and a half centimeters, and a 1973 Shell example exceeds 17 centimeters overall. Within the Canadian family, ES's smaller-scale counterpart was produced under the EC code; a 1964 Shell EC has been measured at between fourteen and fifteen centimeters.