History of Tobacco and Smoking

Ads ran in the 60s and 70s were very popular amongst children, and were said to be more popular than Mickey Mouse.

American Indians viewed tobacco as a cure-all.

Tobacco plants grow natively in North and South America and is in the same family as the potato, pepper, and the poisonous nightshade, a very deadly plant.

Tobacco was discovered through exploration trips.  Tobacco was brought to Europe, and quickly gained a cure-all reputation.

By the 1600’s, tobacco had gained widespread popularity, and was often used as currency.

As more people consumed tobacco, negative effects began to be noticed, especially the difficulty to discontinue its consumption.

In 1760, Pierre Lorillard established a company in New York City to process tobacco, cigars, and snuff.

The first tobacco advertisement in the US ran in 1789.  What is now Lorillard Tobacco Company promoted their snuff in a local New York newspaper.  Available manufacturing and transportation technology limited the distribution of tobacco products.

In 1883, James Bonsack invented the automated cigarette rolling machine, which cut the cigarette retail price in half.  It also dramatically increased production; from 40,000 hand-rolled cigarettes a day to 4 million cigarettes daily.

When color lithography was invented in the 1870s, the advertising and packaging industries were revolutionized, giving way to brand strength in the tobacco industry.

Companies went as far as including small collectible cards in the packages, featuring movie stars, famous athletes, and Native American chiefs.  This was discontinued to save paper during WWII, but some of the rarer cards sell for more than $2 million as collectibles today.

Cigarettes were issued free of cost to soldiers in WW11, courtesy of the tobacco companies.  They came up with fancy slogans and were soon airing advertisements endorsed by dentists, doctors, babies, and famous athletes.

The 1950s was considered the golden era for tobacco companies. 

Increasing public scrutiny took off in 1964, when the US Surgeon General released his Advisory Committee Report on Smoking and Health, linking smoking with lung cancer, emphysema, and other diseases.

The FDA sought to gain control over the industry in 1996, labeling cigarettes as an “addictive drug”, but was ruled against by the Supreme Court in 2000, claiming the FDA was never given the proper authority to regulate tobacco by Congress.

Cigarettes are now assigned a negative spotlight, as it is now clearly known to cause lung cancer, amongst other diseases.  Major initiatives have sprung from time to time to discourage cigarette smoking and tobacco use, but with no success.

Will America ever be able to quit the cigs??

Sources:
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1905530,00.html
http://academic.udayton.edu/health/syllabi/tobacco/history.htm#begin
http://inventors.about.com/od/tstartinventions/a/Tobacco.htm