Henry Leonard & Thomas Inc.

Henry Leonard & Thomas Inc., known as HLT, is one of the most defining companies of mid-twentieth-century American series-production pipemaking. It was founded on May 31, 1938, in the Ozone Park neighborhood of Queens, New York, by Henry J. Lavietes and two partners. Within fifteen years of its founding, the company had grown large enough to purchase a brand both older and far more famous than itself, Dr. Grabow.

The New York Years and Royalton

In its early years, the company's mainstay was patented small mechanisms. Records indicate that a mouthpiece (stem) arrangement developed by Henry Lavietes, used in both pipes and cigarette holders, was patent-protected on March 9, 1943. The innovation that truly made the brand's name, however, was the Royalton filter chamber; its patent is said to have been obtained in 1944. This cavity opened into the shank was meant to trap condensing moisture and tar before it reached the mouth, and was a typical example of the filter and moisture-trapping systems rapidly multiplying in the American market of the era. Although HLT's catalogue contained many other lines, the name that has lasted has been Royalton.