page_title: Cigar
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Cigar / History
caption_attribution_description: English: This photo shows the inside of an Ybor City cigar factory, circa 1920. It's from the historical collection of the Tampa-Hillsborough County Public library, and it's been published in MANY books and magazine articles concerning Ybor City, is reproduced (in huge dimensions) on the inside wall of Ybor Square, and has been painted into a couple of murals around town showing local history. It's definitely in the public domain.
context_page_description: A cigar is a rolled bundle of dried and fermented tobacco leaves made to be smoked. They are produced in a wide variety of sizes and shapes. Since the 20th century, almost all cigars are made of three distinct components: the filler, the binder leaf which holds the filler together, and a wrapper leaf, which is often the best leaf used. Often there will be a cigar band printed with the cigar manufacturer's logo. Modern cigars often come with 2 bands, especially Cuban Cigar bands, showing Limited Edition bands displaying the year of production.
  Cigar tobacco is grown in significant quantities primarily in Central America and the islands of the Caribbean, including Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Honduras, Mexico, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Panama, and Puerto Rico; it is also produced in the Eastern United States, the Mediterranean countries of Italy and Spain, and in Indonesia and the Philippines of Southeast Asia.
  The origins of cigar smoking are unknown. A Mayan ceramic pot from Guatemala dating back to the 10th century depicts people smoking tobacco leaves tied with a string.
context_section_description: Tobacco was widely diffused among all of the indigenous people of the islands of the Caribbean. Italian explorer Christopher Columbus is generally credited with the introduction of tobacco to Europe. During his 1492 journey, three of his crewmen Rodrigo de Jerez, Hector Fuentes and Luis de Torres, are said to have encountered tobacco for the first time on the island of Hispaniola, (present day Haiti and the Dominican Republic), when natives presented them with dry leaves that spread a peculiar fragrance.  His sailors reported that the Taínos on the island of Cuba smoked a primitive form of cigar, with twisted, dried tobacco leaves rolled in other leaves such as palm or plantain.
  In time, Spanish and other European sailors adopted the practice of smoking rolls of leaves, as did the Conquistadors. Smoking primitive cigars spread to Spain and Portugal and eventually France, most probably through Jean Nicot, the French ambassador to Portugal, who gave his name to nicotine. Later, tobacco use spread to Italy and, after Sir Walter Raleigh's voyages to the Americas, to Britain. Smoking became familiar throughout Europe—in pipes in Britain—by the mid-16th century.
  Spanish cultivation of tobacco began in earnest in 1531 on the island of Santo Domingo. In 1542, tobacco started to be grown commercially in North America, when Spaniards established the first cigar factory in Cuba. Tobacco was originally thought to have medicinal qualities, but some considered it evil. It was denounced by Philip II of Spain and James I of England.
  Around 1592, the Spanish galleon San Clemente brought 50 kilograms (110 lb) of tobacco seed to the Philippines over the Acapulco-Manila trade route. It was distributed among Roman Catholic missionaries, who found excellent climates and soils for growing high-quality tobacco there.
  The use of the cigar did not become popular until the mid 18th century, and although there are few drawings from this era, there are some reports.
  In Seven Years' War it is believed Israel Putnam brought back a cache of Havana cigars, making cigar smoking popular in the US after the American Revolution. He also brought Cuban tobacco seeds, which he planted in the Hartford area of New England. This reportedly resulted in the development of the renowned shade-grown Connecticut wrapper.
  Towards the end of the 18th century and in the 19th century, cigar smoking was common, while cigarettes were comparatively rare. In the early 20th century, Rudyard Kipling wrote his famous smoking poem, "The Betrothed".
  The cigar business was an important industry and factories employed many people before mechanized manufacturing of cigars became practical. Cigar workers in both Cuba and the US were active in labor strikes and disputes from early in the 19th century, and the rise of modern labor unions can be traced to the CMIU and other cigar worker unions.
  In 1869, Spanish cigar manufacturer Vicente Martinez Ybor moved his Principe de Gales (Prince of Wales) operations from the cigar manufacturing center of Havana, Cuba to Key West, Florida to escape the turmoil of the Ten Years' War. Other manufacturers followed, and Key West became an important cigar manufacturing center. In 1885, Ybor moved again, buying land near the small city of Tampa, Florida and building the largest cigar factory in the world at the time in the new company town of Ybor City. Friendly rival and Flor de Sánchez y Haya owner Ignacio Haya built his factory nearby the same year, and many other cigar manufacturers followed, especially after an 1886 fire that gutted much of Key West. Thousands of Cuban and Spanish tabaqueros came to the area from Key West, Cuba and New York to produce hundreds of millions of cigars annually. Local output peaked in 1929, when workers in Ybor City and West Tampa rolled over 500,000,000 "clear Havana" cigars, earning the town the nickname "Cigar Capital of the World". At its peak, there were 150 cigar factories in Ybor city, but by early in the next decade, the factories had closed.
  In New York, cigars were made by rollers working in their homes. It wa
caption: Inside an Ybor City cigar factory c. 1920
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