Best bang for buck estate pipes.

Ehrlich and Bertram are excellent American makes that generally go for peanuts. Bertram was known as the "American Dunhill", such was the quality of their pipes. Sasieni Mayfairs are fine smoking pipes. Arly Curtz' pipes go for very reasonable prices and are fine smokers.

The interesting thing about Algerian briar is that it was not held in high esteem by pipemakers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It was thought to be too soft and prone to cracking. That's one reason you see so many "no name" pipes made from Algerian briar. It was the cheap stuff. But pipemakers learned how to cure it and work it and learned to appreciate its smoking properties.

I suspect that the reason you don't see a lot of low quality pipes from the early 20th century is that they simply didn't hold up over time and wound up in the trash. Every market has its high and low end products.