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Cigarettes History
Tobacco is an agricultural product processed from the leaves of the plants. Tobacco had already been used by the Native Americans before discovered by the European settlers. Indians used it as a recreational drug or for trade. In some North American tribes only shamans or medicine men were allowed to smoke processed tobacco.
Discovery - 1492
The dried tobacco leaves were discovered by Christopher Columbus in 1492. He received them as a gift from the Indians but threw the leaves away. But then Columbus noticed that those leaves had a great value among the tribes. Gradually Columbus’s companions discovered the use of the valuable dried leaves: smoking and then snuffing. In 1493, Ramon Pane, the monk who accompanied Columbus on his second journey and who is considered to be the first to introduce tobacco to Europe, describes in length Indian smoking pipes. In 1499 Amerigo Vespucci noticed yet another Indian habit of chewing tobacco leaves. Indians carried two little pouches around there necks – one with the leaves and the other with some kind of white powder. The Indians damped the leaves with saliva and then added the white powder creating a sort of chewing tobacco.
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1500-1700
From that point on, the tobacco was spreads around the world by sailors: China and Japan, India, and other faraway countries. The leaves were also introduced to other European countries: England, Poland, Holland, Germany, etc. Queen Elizabeth I even ordered to build a settlement to cultivate these addictive plants in the Americas. Soon the Europe was caught in smoking using tobacco not only for pleasure but also as “cash money” – King James I increases import taxes on tobacco and tobacco products to 4000% (from 2 pens to 6 shillings 10 pence/lb). An interesting fact is that even somewhat four centuries ago some doctors warned against the dangers of tobacco. In the seventeenth century wasn’t great for tobacco – in England, Russia and some other countries it was banned and smokers heavily punished. In America smoking was prohibited in and outdoors because of the fire hazard, smokers were fined and the money from those fines was used to buy firefighting equipment. Russian tsar Peter the Great also lifted the ban establishing a trade monopoly with England.
1700-1900
In the eighteenth century due to flourishing tobacco business, lifelong slavery was legalized in Virginia. Cigars were first introduced in America and the rare lung cancer was first described. Moreover, since tobacco taxes were smothering American growers who owed merchants millions of pounds, the colonies decided to rebel starting the American Revolution. In 1832 in Turkey the first cigarette as we know it was invented by the Egyptian artilleryman. The first motion cigarette ad was produced by Thomas Edison. Along with blooming tobacco business, smoking was widely prohibited in the US due to its harmfulness. In England, London tobacconist Phillip Morris began making his own cigarette. Old Bond Street became the center for the retail tobacco trade. Also numerous anti-tobacco societies emerge on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean, smoking is prohibited in the US Congress and research articles are published on the dangers of continued smoking.
1900-2000
The first half of the twentieth century was quite conflicted about smoking: it was mostly prohibited punishable by heavy fines, businesses refused to hire smokers, etc., while cigarette manufacturers flourished even then influencing legislation (FDA manipulation) and becoming increasingly powerful. Women began smoking developing rather strong and quick addiction to the substance. Phillip Morris recognized it as a potential target market and released Marlboro’s Medium. Now Marlboro was also the regular guest of bridge and cocktail parties, riding in limousines and going shopping. Emilia Earhart endorses Lucky Strikes. It was indeed the age of controversy with so many scientific warnings against smoking and huge billboards featuring Marlboro cowboy. For the next fifty years little has changed with regards to the controversy but additional measures were taken to inform the public about hazards of smoking. A lot has changed since the world was introduced tobacco but one thing hasn’t – tobacco products remain the favorite recreational drug.
Paper
In cigarettes, the paper holding the tobacco inside may vary in size or components. It may also control the burning rate and the stability of the ash produced by smoking. At the mouthpiece the paper is usually thicker to protect the filter from the saliva and deliver the smoke through several microscopic holes. Major manufacturers always work on improving their products. Thus, because cigarettes are considered to be causing numerous fires, in the 1980s Philip Morris and RJ Reynolds developed fire-safe cigarette paper. For some reason it was never marketed… Now almost thirty years later there are "fire-safe" cigarettes – when a cigarette is left to burn on an ashtray, for example, it will self-extinguish causing no damage to the environment. Currently, the US and Canada mandated that all the cigarettes sold in their borders are fire safe. The European Union is trying to do the same.
Rolling paper
Rolling paper is used by consumers who don't want to buy expensive machine-rolled cigarettes or by those who want to use other herbs. Usually it's made of wood pulp, hemp, flax or rice. Rolling paper is a rectangle of very thin sheet. Rice rolling papers are usually used either for cannabis cigarettes or for high-quality tobacco cigarettes by connoisseurs. Modern rolling paper comes in different flavors to enhance smoking experience.
A bit of history
Cigarette as we know it is a relatively new invention – Indians, Aztecs and Mayans used hollow reeds, or canes to smoke tobacco leaves. Others rolled the leaves in thrown away papers until one Egyptian artilleryman invented the cigarette as we know it today. In the Turk/Egyptian war in 1832, during the siege of Acre, the Egyptian crew of artillerymen improved their fire rate by rolling the gunpowder in paper rolls. They were rewarded with tobacco but had no pipe to smoke it. So, they rolled it in the paper, just like the gunpowder. This custom spread among the soldiers of both armies and so on and so on…
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