Cigar maker

“ Many of the 5-cent cigars sold so extensively, contain a large proportion of Havana tobacco, and make a fairly fragrant and pleasant smoke. It is said that there are upwards of 100,000 open and proprietary brands of cigars on the market.
Cigarettes.—The sale of these little paper tubes filled with tobacco, has grown enormously within a few years and is still increasing. It is whispered that the ladies even, sometimes seek to find in them a whiff of the solace and comfort their brothers and 53husbands find in the pipe or cigar. There are many favorite brands on the market. ”

“ When we think of the extraordinary uses to which paper is applied, it is not so startling to learn that this material may even enter into the composition of our post-prandial cigar. If we are to believe the newspapers, millions of cigars are annually manufactured in Havana without so much as a single fibre of tobacco-leaf being utilised in the process of their fabrication. The great straw-paper factory in New York State has for some time been making a peculiar sort of extremely thin fine paper, which it has been discovered is used for making cigars. ”

“ From five hundred to fifteen hundred cigars are made in a day, according to the expertness of the manipulator and the kind of tobacco. Machines have not as yet been found to work well. The machine cigars are finished at the end by hand. He remarked that machines never can succeed so well as men, until they have the brains of men. A very nice widow, who kept a cigar store in New York, told me that many more women are employed in making cigars in Philadelphia than in New York; but the cigars made and sold there are mostly of the cheap kind, selling for two or three cents apiece. ”

“ The remaining laborers are employed in assorting and packing the cigars for market. Only the choicest tobacco is used in this factory—each first-class cigar made here being warranted equal to any Havana brand. Thirty-five thousand cigars are manufactured daily, consuming thirty thousand pounds of tobacco monthly. The most amusing sight of all is to see these workmen drink water: it is contained in a kind of earthenware vessel which they call a “monkey-jug,” made from a porous earth obtained in Cuba, and shaped something like our American gallon-jug, only the orifice is on the side. ”

“ But common sense seems to be on the side of the machine. We quite understand the difficulty of killing old prejudices and time honored customs; but it is difficult to understand how the flavor or quality of a cigar filler can be different whether it is pressed into the shape by a machine or by the hand of a workman; or what the precise improvement is when a wrapper leaf is put on and licked by a workman rather than by a clean machine under perfect sanitary conditions. ”

“ The natural properties of certain classes of tobacco render them especially suited for cigar-making; others are best fitted for smoking in pipes, and there are numerous qualities which are valuable for snuff-making. National tastes and habits again frequently determine the destination of the [185] weed. Thus, heavy, full-flavoured cigars and strong pipe-tobacco are in favour in North America, while in Europe, lighter, and more brisk-burning are sought after. ”

“ His mother went toward the rear of the house—more soulless machines, like the housecleaning-robot, and the laundry-robot, to look after. He went into his father's office and found the cigar humidor, just where it had been when he'd stolen cigars out of it six years ago and thought his father never suspected what he was doing.
Now, why didn't they export this tobacco? It was better than anything they grew on Terra; well, at least it was different, just as Poictesme brandy was different from Terran bourbon or Baldur honey-rum. ”

“ The manufacturer will, without any great trouble, be able to make the assortment for strong and weak tripa according to the quality of capa which is going to be used, a most essential point in cigar making, and thus he will be able to make cigars with all perfection. All these advantages will result from adopting the reform in the manner of sorting which we propose. ”

“ Besides this, there is another warehouse of nearly equal size, where finer kinds of tobacco are deposited, many of them in packages of buffalo-hide, marked "Giron," and Manilla for cheroots, in packages of sacking lined with palmetto leaves. There is still another warehouse for cigars, called the Cigar Floor, in which there are frequently one thousand five hundred chests, valued at one hundred pounds each, at an average, or one hundred and fifty thousand pounds in cigars alone. ”

“ The flavor and burning quality of a cigar always determine its character, and are found in perfection in those made of fine even-colored leaf. Dark cigars (p. 303) have a thicker leaf or more body, and consequently are stronger than light-colored cigars. When the cigar is made of fine, well-sweat tobacco, and contains the full quantity of fillers, the pellet of ashes will be firm and strong, and should possess the same color all through, if the filler, binder and wrapper are of the same shade of color. ”

“ During the early years of the nineteenth century women on the farms made practically all the domestic cigars then consumed in this country, and in many places the home-made cigar was a favorite medium of exchange. The earliest cigar factory in America was established in West Suffield, Conn., in 1810 and employed only women. ”

“ But bless my soul,” he went on after a pause, “what a refining influence a cigar has.”
“If it’s a good one,” suggested a boy porter.
“They’re all good,” declared the new man with enthusiasm. “They’re like the ladies in that respect. Some are better’n others, but they’re all good.”
“Not a married man, then?” asked a foreman.
“I’m a bloomin’ bachelor,” said the new chum. “And what a thing it is on your Sunday off, when you’re waiting at the end of her road, to light up a cigar with a fine aroma to it. ”

“ And the cigar need not consist entirely of Havana tobacco. A cigar of choice flavor is made of a mixture of tobaccos—Havana “filler” and “binder,” with, say, a “Connecticut seed” or Sumatra wrapper.
The manufacture of cigars has without doubt aided largely in building up the business of Key West. One authority says that there are two hundred factories, employing five thousand operatives, and transacting a business amounting to seven millions of dollars annually. ”

“ He then lays a few fragments of tobacco (tripa) in the centre or a leaf strip and rolls the whole into the shape of a cigar, and taking then a wrapper, rolls it spirally around the cigar. If the workman is skillful, he makes it of just the right length and size, without any trimming of the knife. The cigars are assorted, counted, and done up in bundles of generally twenty-five each, and then packed in the boxes, ready for market, under their different names of Londres, Regalias, etc. ”

“ The object of these compliments took them as a matter of course, and after hunting up the stump of last night's cigar, and shredding it with his knife, crammed it into a clay pipe and smoked tranquilly. Flower found a solitary cigar, one of the Blue Posts' best, and with a gaze which wandered idly from the chest of drawers on one side of the room to the old china dogs on the little mantel-shelf on the other, smoked in silence. ”

“ Not only are we smoking cheaper cigars, but we are making them last longer. How do we do this? Easily, dear reader, easily. We don't light them, that's all! We bite the end off very carefully, and insert the cigar at a rakish angle in the middle of our expression, and carry it around like that for nearly an hour before we touch a match to it. That way two cigars can be made to do the work of six. The worst of lighting a cigar is that it becomes oxidized so quickly. After that it isn't any good, except possibly as tooth-powder. ”

“ The manufacture of the finished article requires highly skilled labour, and long practice gives the workman an amount of accuracy and dexterity in producing cigar after cigar, alike in shape and size, with a rapidity that is truly wonderful. After the leaves have been properly cured, they are sorted according to size and colour. The centre rib is then extracted, an operation requiring great care. Each workman is seated before a flat board, and is supplied with a bunch of perfect leaves and a pile of broken tobacco. ”

“ Select a firm, well-made cigar—one that contains a good quantity of fillers—avoiding, however, in Havana cigars, one made too nicely, as it is sometimes the case that superior external appearance is made to cover defects in the more important qualities.
Such a selection will insure a cigar of good quality; one that will hold fire and last the length of time appropriate to its size. A cigar should not be chosen simply because it is made well, and neither because its outside appearance (wrapper) is fine, both in color and quality of leaf; rather depend upon the manufacture of the brand. ”

“ It injures the showcase to drop the money on it, and at times it is difficult to pick up the change. The little porcupine-like rubber mat is handy. The cigar cutter is all right. A revolving needle might be used to improve the draft of the improperly made cigars; it would be more practical than the porous plasters frequently recommended on the back of the head for the same purpose.
I guess the hen, in her quill, has us all beat on toothpicks. A man who built a large stack at his mill to get a better draft for the fire had an eight-inch pipe leading from the fireplace. ”

“ Prior to 1901 the American and Continental Tobacco Companies manufactured, sold, and distributed cigars, stogies, and cheroots. In the year stated the companies determined to engage in the business upon a larger scale. Under agreement with Powell, Smith, & Company, large manufacturers and dealers in cigars, they caused the incorporation in New Jersey of the American Cigar Company 'for trading and manufacturing,' etc., to which all three conveyed their said business, and it has since carried on the same. ”

“ As the tobacco is of good body, the cigars do not usually burn as well as other kinds. Select a light-colored rather than a dark cigar if one of good quality is desired. Both the cigars and cheroots are made of the same quality of leaf, and are of about the same size—differing, however, in shape. There are but few grades of Manilla cigars, and most of them are solid and well wrapped. They are flat rather than round, and draw well but do not hold fire like some other cigars. The leaf makes a very good wrapper for a tobacco of its thickness and strength.
SWISS CIGARS.
Swiss Cigars. ”

“ Whether you, as a smoker, buy one cigar, five cigars, five hundred or five thousand, you pay the same price per stuck, and there is no choice as to shops, so far as quality is concerned. Whether you buy in the Graben or the Taberstrasse of Vienna, or in an obscure shop in an obscure village a hundred miles from the capitol, you get the same quality of cigar for five, seven, nine, ten, or twelve kreutzers, in the one place as in the other. All come from one factory, and their goodness or badness never varies. ”

“ Cutting leaf is largely manufactured in this country, especially near the great leaf growing sections. Most of this is used here, the leaf for manufacture abroad being exported in hogsheads for cutting in any form desired. Snuff leaf is exported largely from this country to Great Britain and France, where are the largest manufacturers of snuff in the world. At the present time the demand seems greater for cutting than for cigar leaf. The growths of the West Indies and South America furnish a large quantity of fine tobacco for cigars, but comparatively little for cutting purposes. ”

“ The large number of establishments is due to the fact that cigar making is still to a large extent a hand-making industry. About 135,000 persons are directly employed in the manufacture, nearly half of whom are women. The capital engaged [Pg 98] in the business is reported as 150 millions and the value of the product 200 million dollars annually. The actual consumer pays about 300 million dollars for the cigars smoked, the difference between the cost of the product and the latter figure being the expense and profit of the retail handlers. ”

“ The former rolls the bunch of filler leaves and presses them into shape. The suction table is used for wrapping the cigar. The operator places the wrapper leaf on a perforated plate. By pressing a foot lever a vacuum is created beneath this plate which holds the leaf smooth and snug against the table. The perforated plate is exactly the form which the wrapper must be to properly fit the cigar. It is easily cut around and trimmed to shape. The bunch from the bunch roller is then quickly encased in the wrapper. Human labor is necessary only to feed the machines and to spread the wrappers. ”

“ Some factories supply export trade almost exclusively. There has been little development of the 104 fine cigar industry except in Louisiana and Florida, though in all cities of the Lower South there are local establishments for the manufacture of cigars from Cuban leaf. Richmond is a center for the manufacture of domestic cigars and cheroots and has one mammoth establishment.
Twenty years or thirty years ago scattered over the South there were thousands of small grist mills which ground the farmer's wheat or corn between stones in the old-fashioned way. ”

“ From the fine gentlemen, who buy their cigars at Delmonico's, or get them direct from the importers, down to the little barefoot boys in the streets, who buy theirs from the Chinamen at the corners or pick up the stumps that are thrown away, all smoke. In some countries pipes and cigarettes are made to do duty by the poorer classes, but in New York cigars seem to be almost invariably preferred. Now, while there is nothing better, in the way of something to smoke, than a first-class Havana cigar, there is nothing nastier than some of the cheap abominations made in that shape in New York. ”