American Toby Jug Museum 

Rip Van Winkle liquor container designed by Geoff Blower and produced by Royal Doulton of Burslem, England, circa 1960 commissioned by W. Walklate. Originally a character from a German folk tale, Rip Van Winkle was popularized by the American writer Washington Irving in his "Sketch Book" of 1819, which included many European stories retold with American settings. A happy-go-lucky farmer, Rip lives at the foot of the Catskill Mountains in the days when America was a British colony. During a ramble one day he meets a group of strange old men dressed in Flemish style costumes, playing ninepins. They ply him with large quantities of Hollands gin, which sends him to sleep for twenty years. Upon waking, Rip Van Winkle finds he has grown a long white beard, his clothes have become ragged, and his house is derelict. The village is also greatly changed; the inn known to him as the King George has become the George Washington. It transpires that Rip set off from his village as a subject of George II but returned as a citizen of the United States. Despite these dramatic changes, he manages to find a role for himself as a village patriarch. Van Winkle asleep against a tree trunk forms the handle of this lighter.