The Wisconsin tobacco reporter. (Edgerton, Wis.) 1877-1950, 1901-10-18
THE
Wisconsin Tobacco Reporter,
Edgerton, Wisconsin.
NOTE BOOK SKETCHES.

The u. S. Tobacco Journal in recent
issue calls attention to condition that
seems likely to affect the future of the
cigar industry, even though the trade
may not have given it much thought
heretofore. In brief the tendency to-
wards consolidation in manufacturing
breeds the danger of the individually OF
the product. The argument of this
Journal is as follows:
A cigar is not machine product pure
and simple, like piece of calico or cloth
or bar of iron or steele. 1t is the ex-
preston and outcome of an individual
effort and has to crafty individual tastes.
Two manufacturers can start to make a
cigar out of the same material, but each
will produce different product, because
no two men have exactly the same taste
and the same skill and because the brains
of no two men work exactly alike, Hence
the brand of every manufacturer bears
it's individual character, and it is to this
individuality that the taste of the con-
sumer becomes attached. Were it not
so, why is it that famous brands. emil
nently successful as long as they were
made under the personal direction of
their inventor and owner, lost their hold
on the public the moment they were
transferred, and had to be discarded
altogether after awhile? Why, anybody
who has studiously followed the course
of our cigar industry during the past
dozen years only could point off hand to
number of our famous brands which
o+ I, Got +ho
tions outlined. Even if the transferred
brands carried with them the name of
their original makers they lost caste with
the public, simply and solely because the
soul of the original maker was out of
them, so to say. These observations are
grounded on immutable facts and un-
shaken experience, and because they are
so fortified they lead us to the conclu-
sion that no matter what combinations
may enter the cigar producing field, they
cannot absorb or paralyze all the success
of individual efforts. The individually
of cigar will always exercise it's sway
ON the public, and it can only be infused
into cigar by an individual manufact-
urer The individuaSmanufact has,
therefore, no reason to become fatalist.
***
President H. S. Frye of the N. e. Tob.
Growers association says he does not
know of any agricultural product in the
entire Temperate zone that pays better
for careful handling than leaf tobacco,
or onethe value of which can be SO sud-
denly and seriously deteriorated. He
tells truth here that every experienced
grower can testify to. Here are a few
dom It's about curing that are worth re-
Don't ever take down wet tobacco: it
never will look we'll again.
Don't put tobacco in a bundle and
stamp it in.
Don't press the bundles too hard.
Don't expect a big price for lot of
rubbish mixed in; this will always show
the first thing when opening bundles for
Don't put water on the tobacco to
dampen it; nine times out of ten it will
do damage.
Don't think your tobacco is all right
and not go near it for month; if you
do, you will find it all wrong.
*x*
Frank S. Baines has lately returned
from visit in the east and tells the
GAINESVILLE Gazette of what he saw.
While away he paid visit to Hartford,
Conn.,, and drove out and inspected fields
of tobacco grown under cloth covering.
He said that in order for person to re-
alize how crop of this tobacco looked
when growing he must 60 there and see
it. It is nine feet from the ground up
to the cloth covering and the tobacco
grows to such height that the tops
touch against the cloth. The yield is
immense and the price more than pays
the grower for the extra cost of the cloth
covering. Nothing but wrapper tobacco
is grown in this way, and as high as S15O
per pound has been offered for the 1901
crop. The growers are holding out for
81, and would not sell at S1.50 Mr..
Baines is firmly convinced that equally
as good tobacco can be grown in WiscoE-
sin by this process and intends trying it
on small scale next season. 1t costs
about $500 an acre to get the covering in
shape. Cheese cloth is used and is WOW
en- in breadths eight feet wide. Two of
these breadths sewn together make
strip sixteen feet wide. A heavy cord is
run into the outside edges of these strips
and used to fasten them to a heavy wire
that runs from section to section of the
framework. Cheese cloth is
we'll adapted for this work as it allows
the rains to filter through and protects
the tobacco from the burning sun, hail
and frost. The United States govern
nent has been fostering this idea of im-
proving the tobacco crop and gives aid
20 farmers who will take the matter up
and give it thorough trial. 1t was
started as an experiment by the govern
nent in Connecticut but now has got
beyond the experimental stage and is be-
ng adopted by the farmers quite gener-
lily in that part of the country. 1t
would be great help to the farmers of
his state especially in the way of pro-
aotion aoaipct frost and hail