CIGAR BOX HERALDRY Murray Eiland There Is Perhaps No Better Way to Portray the ‘Capitalist Class’ Than Old World

Volume XXXVI Winter 2014 Number 1 CIGAR BOX HERALDRY Murray Eiland There is perhaps no better way to portray the ‘capitalist class’ than Old World. Cigars spread dressed in tails, a top hat, and smoking a cigar. In some cases it through the western appears that the model for the figure is Winston Churchill, who Mediterranean, almost was photographed many times posing with his fuming attribute. certainly under the guidance It is difficult to tell if the cigar smoking caricature is a badge of of the historical figure Jean infamy, or a clever ploy to divert attention away from health risks Nicot - who gave his name and onto an idealized vision of an elite lifestyle. As with so many to nicotine - the French things, context is everything. The phrase “close but no cigar” ambassador to Portugal. comes from the tradition of giving a cigar as a prize. Cigars have Smoking became familiar come to represent different things to different people, and in the throughout Europe, but in modern world their advertising has drawn upon a rich store of some countries like Britain history. Fig. 3 tobacco was put into pipes. It is well known It is interesting to speculate why the British preferred smoking in that wine producers pipes. While the issue is far from solved, it seems that smoking advertise their real or tobacco in pipes was a custom of native North Americans. One of imaginary aristocratic the earliest industries in Jamestown, and perhaps the earliest printing connections via coats in America, is on clay pipes.2 In 1614 John Rolfe, the husband of arms on wine labels. of Pocahontas, sent the Some wines use the arms first successful tobacco of the region where the harvest to England. He wine is produced (a obtained tobacco seeds regional or geographical from Caribbean species, designation). Other as the local tobacco, wines use arms, real Nicotiana rustica, grown or imaginary, of their by the Indians, did not owners. Cigar boxes taste as good. At this Fig. 1 can also use heraldry time these seeds would (although not as often as wines). The way they do this is a little have been hard to obtain. different from wine, but before considering this aspect it is perhaps Selling tobacco to non- Fig. 4 best to digress and discuss the history of the cigar. Smoking Spaniards was a capital offense. One of the personalized pipes, tobacco originated in the southern part of the New World. The with the name to Sir Walter Raleigh stamped on it, was found in term for smoking rolled tobacco used by the Mayans was sikar.1 Jamestown. During this time Raleigh was likely incarcerated in the There are depictions of ancient Mayans smoking rolled tobacco. Tower of London. Although he did encourage the settlement on According to early Spanish accounts, native people on the island Roanoke Island (modern North Carolina) he was not associated of Cuba smoked a with Jamestown. In any case Raleigh is credited with popularizing primitive form of tobacco smoking via pipes in England. Making a pipe for him may cigar. The island, as is have been a tribute well known, became to his patronage of a major producer of smoking, or perhaps cigars. The Spanish a plea for him to cigarra (‘cicada’) is support Jamestown. likely a derivation History suggests of the Mayan word. that – at least at Both the insect and a first – the British/ dried roll of tobacco American culture have a similar shape. did not embrace Columbus and his men smoking cigars. The are generally credited result is that when with the introduction cigars were smoked of tobacco to the Fig. 2 Fig. 5 in America they were Fig. 6 Fig. 7 associated with an exotic, and non-Anglo-Saxon, culture. This therefore circumvent the tax. Therefore a box could represent tradition is reflected in the origins of the finest tobacco, which was the products of a number of different people. This includes the Cuba. Many American producers of tobacco who would go on to tobacco, the roller, the box maker, and the producer of the label. claim a legitimate or imaginary connection with Havana. Some labels have the maker’s name inconspicuously at the bottom Prior roughly to the Civil War cigars in America were (where it is noted it will be recorded with the figures). Cigar makers commonly sold singularly, but they could also be bought in bulk of the 1870’s capitalized on the fact that the box lids could be and tied into bundles of 25 or 50 cigars which were all tied together used to advertise the contents. Labels were applied to the inside lid with a ribbon. There that would be left open. It is no surprise that producers spared no were no brand names expense to make their labels stand out, and soon they literally did on the cigars then, but with embossed paper. Bright colors and metal foil were also used this would change. The to decorate what would become prime examples of the printer’s popularity of cigar art. Given the relative expense of cigars, that considerable effort smoking suddenly was made to make the labels as attractive as possible (unlike many surged during the Civil other consumables one may purchase in a general goods store).4 War. While some have Cigar label suggested that stress collecting reached led to more smoking, as a peak in the heady during the second world 1990’s, when cigar war, there are other smoking was extolled factors as well. General and before smoking Grant was a visible was largely banned smoker. Before the war from bars and he apparently smoked Fig. 10 Fig. 8 restaurants. It was a pipe, but during the also a time when it seemed collectables of all kinds would do war he switched to cigars. He obviously did not mind images of him nothing but appreciate in value. As a result, many labels were found, smoking a cigar to be released in the media. Perhaps, like Churchill, in pristine unused condition, in former factories, warehouses, and he was drawing upon the inherent phallic imagery of the cigar. smoke shops. Prices for labels went up during the decade. Many After the Civil War, cigar smoking rose in popularity so that there labels rose in value, which stimulated more to be found. Eventually were a number of different producers in America. Tobacco rollers the market stabilized to where it is today.5 There were so many could practice their trade at home. Somewhat surprisingly, there producers that there are a myriad of themes to collect. Women are were many rollers in New York, a place not now associated with of course a popular theme, but there are also military, patriotic, producing cigars. By 1900 there were many thousand producers and even humorous labels. The idea of using colorful lithographic and many small shops that rolled and sold their own brands. In an labels, started when Ramon Allones, a Galician immigrant to Cuba. attempt to recover debts incurred by the war, the US government He used this new media for the brand he started in 1837. The decided to place a tax upon cigars, and this required that there be a open lid soon become the visual fly paper for the honey trap. The definite quantity that would be taxed. Cigars were placed in boxes industry grew apace which were secured during the 19th by a tax stamp.3 At century, and other first the cigar box brands soon adopted housed bundles of this idea.6 Tobacco cigars which were is still grown in the tied with ribbon. New World, and They were made in the 19th century of wood and had there were a welter a lid that could of producers in be nailed shut. It the eastern United was essential that States. Now of the box be made course China has tamper proof, as entered the tobacco a seller could re- market as a bulk stock a box with producer, but it un-taxed cigars and Fig. 9 Fig. 11 seems the New World is the major producer of tobacco used in high end cigars. Castile and Leon depict the traditional arms of Castile (the yellow However, the printing process owes much to Germany. castle) quartered with the arms of Leon (the red lion). The lion Stone Lithography has a fascinating history. Aloys Senfelderwas design is attributed to Alfonso VII, king of Castile and Leon in born in Prague in 1771. A lawyer with a first love of acting, he ran 1126. The castle is attributed to his grandson Alfonso VIII. In into trouble after a play he wrote was late due to the printer’s fault. 1230, Ferdinand III united the two kingdoms and quartered the Hand-engraved copper plates took too much time to prepare, and arms as a symbol of the union. The arms of Castile and Leon they soon wore out. Working with Bavarian limestone, he invented a appear in the modern arms of Los Angeles, California,12 as well as much more efficient method that became popular. Unlike previous in the governor’s seal of Alabama (and many other places as well). printmaking techniques like engraving, which required advanced The Viceroyalty of New Spain was a viceroyalty of the crown of craft skills, lithography was more accurate. The artist can draw Castile. It was formed in 1535 and comprised the territories from directly onto the stone plate with familiar pens.7 The first private North America and the Caribbean to the Philippines. U.S. concern to sell stone produced prints was Currier & Ives, King Philip II of Spain granted Havana the title of City in 1592 which is still justly famous for its designs.

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