Jay Flowers First Case

JB Cases

JB Cases

www.jbcases.com
Silver Member
Thanks to the generosity of Doug "Smorgass Bored" Wiley I have been fortunate to receive the most meaningful item I have ever acquired in my 20 years in this business.

According to to Doug this is the first case that Jay Flowers ever made. Doug had owned it for 18 years and got it from Jay himself. As most of you know Doug is a Tampa resident and has been around the scene there forever. The case is in great condition and has been well cared for.

It is not now nor will ever be for sale so please don't ask unless you are prepared to offer enough money to set up Smorg and I for life :-)

As many of you know the reason I started Instroke is because I had a Jay Flowers case and my cue shot out of it when I was careless and left it on the corner of a table open and someone else knocked it off the table. I dismantled that case in order to study it and never put it back together.

I met Jay in the late 90's in Vegas when he introduced himself to me while his team was playing a match near to our booth. He gave me the green light to do a line of Flowers cases and we agreed to talk more about it. Sadly I never followed through on it and Jay passed on before we ever talked again. Now I am proud to own his first case, one that he made for himself.

Jay actually did a lot of different styles as seen by the creativity in this one. In the coming months you will see me honoring that diversity more and more as I replicate more of the great elements he worked into his cases.

Thank you Doug!

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I'm Glad That It Brings You Happiness And It Was A Pleasure To Deal With You

"Someday, and this day may never come. I will call on you to do me a service and this service you will do. But, until that day, accept the generosity of your Dougfather and have a drink and enjoy the festivities."

"Don" Doug

(don't forget the mint condition 1991 Cue Collectors SNAP magazine with the Gus Szamboti cover that was your Bonus gift) :)


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I have one very much like this. The tooling and coloring look almost identical. Do you think the tooling on this is done by hand or machine embossed? Mine looks so uniform/perfect.. and so does this, that it makes me wonder????.

Mine has the more "standard" 8" pockets with side zippers and the lid on mine snaps on each side. Other than that it looks the same. Of course the back of mine doesn't have a fancy famous name on it. :(
 
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JimS said:
I have one very much like this. The tooling and coloring look almost identical. Do you think the tooling on this is done by hand or machine embossed? Mine looks so uniform/perfect.. and so does this, that it makes me wonder????.

Mine has the more "standard" 8" pockets with side zippers and the lid on mine snaps on each side. Other than that it looks the same. Of course the back of mine doesn't have a fancy famous name on it. :(
Click to expand...

Well, Chris Tate reported that Jay had made some stamps to use in a press to make the production easier. Most toolers however tool to a guideline meaning they scribe a faint line or even a hard line and then they do the decorative elements based off of that line.

You can see the guidelines on this case and a few times that the stamp is slightly off so it makes me think that this case at least was tooled one impression at a time by hand.

Perhaps, if indeed this was case #1 or a very early example then Jay may have used the tooling pattern as the template for his press dies. I know that this pattern is very common on Flowers cases so that would make sense.

I can't even remember mine that well but I'd bet it was close to yours. I bought it from a Flowers dealer, Andi Sattler, in Germany. Andi met Jay after I sent Andi to Florida with two friends to play on the Florida tour in 1990.
 
JimS said:
I have one very much like this. The tooling and coloring look almost identical. Do you think the tooling on this is done by hand or machine embossed? Mine looks so uniform/perfect.. and so does this, that it makes me wonder????.

Mine has the more "standard" 8" pockets with side zippers and the lid on mine snaps on each side. Other than that it looks the same. Of course the back of mine doesn't have a fancy famous name on it. :(
Click to expand...


Jim,
Anything like these: http://www.palmercollector.com/JayFlowers.html

Doug
 
JB Cases said:
Well, Chris Tate reported that Jay had made some stamps to use in a press to make the production easier. Most toolers however tool to a guideline meaning they scribe a faint line or even a hard line and then they do the decorative elements based off of that line.

You can see the guidelines on this case and a few times that the stamp is slightly off so it makes me think that this case at least was tooled one impression at a time by hand.

Perhaps, if indeed this was case #1 or a very early example then Jay may have used the tooling pattern as the template for his press dies. I know that this pattern is very common on Flowers cases so that would make sense.

I can't even remember mine that well but I'd bet it was close to yours. I bought it from a Flowers dealer, Andi Sattler, in Germany. Andi met Jay after I sent Andi to Florida with two friends to play on the Florida tour in 1990.
Click to expand...

I have a couple of his cases that I am pretty sure are stamped. They are patterened designs like basket weave. There are a lot with hand tooling as well. I think the stampings happened later on when he was making a lot of cases. For example, the picture below shows a basket weave pattern that I think is stamped.

Interesting that Doug's is his first case. I have one very similar to it. He seemed to immediately get a great design right off the bat - a home run in my opinion.

Chris
 

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(don't forget the mint condition 1991 Cue Collectors SNAP magazine with the Gus Szamboti cover that was your Bonus gift) :)


.[/QUOTE]


Hey Doug, Alot has been said about this issue of Snap, I have it and many others, Not going to sell them, but what are they worth? I like where it say's Buddy Hall offered a guy a New caddilac for his Buska back.

I have these and lots of "American cueist", and All about pool mags. Many great articles with Hercek, B.Szamboti, Jerry franklin, and many others.

Reading these is where I got my true start in cue making.
 
RFisher said:
(don't forget the mint condition 1991 Cue Collectors SNAP magazine with the Gus Szamboti cover that was your Bonus gift) :)


.
Click to expand...


Hey Doug, Alot has been said about this issue of Snap, I have it and many others, Not going to sell them, but what are they worth? I like where it say's Buddy Hall offered a guy a New caddilac for his Buska back.

I have these and lots of "American cueist", and All about pool mags. Many great articles with Hercek, B.Szamboti, Jerry franklin, and many others.

Reading these is where I got my true start in cue making.[/QUOTE]


The picture that I have in my avatar of this Cue Collectors issue is from e-bay, where the seller had a Buy-It-Now price of $40 plus S & H.

Issue #1 with Buddy on the cover is the most valuable (I have 2, 1 autographed by Buddy Hall) and the Florida issue is highly sought also (I have a copy autographed by Ray Martin, Steve Mizerak and Gene "The Glove" Catron). I have the complete set, even after sending John that Szamboti issue.

Someone here sent JAM the entire set for Free and I think that was an 'extremely' nice gesture.... imo
She puts it to good use. I miss her posts.

Doug
 
Smorgass Bored said:
She was driven off by troublemaking bottom feeders.

Doug
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Nah, it was probably just the everyday run-of-the-mill, sucker-punching trolls that drove her off.
I think she just leaves before her temper gets the best of them.
If she chooses to, JAM can throw a long, hot napalm-like flame when she gets ticked off. :D
JoeyA
 
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