A fellow digger from days gone by

4 agosto 2026

Summer is a time for unexpected encounters. Today, an old excavation companion of Don Duco’s visited the museum. In the late 1980s, the two of them stood side by side - shovels in hand - at the dump site of the Gambier factory in northern France. It turns out Philippe Canon still lives in Givet, now with a wife and child. Even after 45 years, the mutual recognition and the common interest in Givet clay pipes remain. Philippe was also deeply impressed by the tour of the museum; forty years on, countless complete Gambier pipes have been retrieved - pipes that were previously known only as archaeological fragments.

A Pipe Maker’s Summer Internship

2 agosto 2026

This August, our museum is hosting Lukas Hensing, an intern from Bremen. He is a historian with an interest in museums, but his primary passion is pipes; in fact, he has been crafting briar pipes himself since the age of fifteen! He is now virtually a master of the craft, having completed internships with contemporary pipe makers in Germany and Denmark. Here at the museum, he aims to bridge the gap in his knowledge regarding the history of pipes made from materials other than wood. We are very curious to see what this exchange will yield.