Tobacco. We know it, and we love it, for the most part. There, of course, are people diametrically opposed to its existence as a consumer product, citing its ill effects on humans, such as contributing to cancer and heart disease, but our society owes a lot to this simple plant. Archaeologists have found some historical evidence that people in Mesoamerica—before it was called that—had been consuming tobacco for some twelve thousand fucking years before Europeans came over, who also thought it was pretty neat and wanted more.
Naturally, while tobacco was cultivated in many places around the globe (once people found out about the shit), the American South was a really robust climate for farming it. The Europeans tried pretty hard to get a solid grow going, but it never worked all that well. The Turks had a very good climate for it as well, and Turkish tobacco is still well-regarded to this day, but they could not deliver the volume that the expanse of Southern land in the USA could do once it started being a serious cash crop.
As it went, small farms became large plantations in no time. Slaves were imported as a labor force, which we all know, but people thought better of that bullshit after some technical innovations in agriculture and a very significant squabble called the goddamn Civil War...which upset basically the entire fucking country for a considerable amount of time, except the Oregon territories and some of the Midwest, because as historians have observed, both settlers and natives here were like, "Wait, what the fuck is going on over there?"
When it began, indigenous people used tobacco for spiritual reasons, as well as just hittin' the pipe when waking up after a long night, and many native cultures still do use it ceremonially to this day, which is pretty cool. It’s cool because that means they don't gotta pay tax on it, as it relates to religion, and also because if anyone has a reason to say "fuck the government," well, it's them.
In post-Columbian America, once Europeans got a taste, they were the primary purchasers of tobacco exports. The notion of a sailor with a pipe originated then, as those who worked sailing ships were often given a ration of dried tobacco. In fact, tobacco was even thought to have curative properties so as to treat illness, and doctors would keep some on hand. However, you might not like how it was administered, as tobacco smoke was given for medical purposes in the form of an enema. This is, incidentally, the origin of the phrase "blowing smoke up your ass."
The establishment of the cigarette, as we know it today, originated in the late 1800s, when a man named James Bonsack invented a machine that expedited the production of rolled tobacco in paper tubes by an order of magnitude. Their popularity surged, but the pre-rolled smokes cost more than loose tobacco and papers, so most people still just hand-rolled or smoked pipes. The filtered cigarette was introduced in the early 20th century but did not catch on readily because smokers were like, "What? Why?" and tended to eschew them. Filters had been around for some time, but usually, as gimmicky things to roll up in your paper to keep crap out of your mouth. In 1935, the British (who were serious as hell about smoking back then) had a startup business named Morris Machine Company, which developed a production machine that stuck filter tips into cigs at little additional cost.
During World War II, the most recent world war at the time, troops got their various rations, on all sides, with a small pack of cigarettes to go with their food, usually 4 to 6, depending. The Germans got 6. The Italians, Americans, and Brits got 4, but that's per ration, so everyone had plenty of smokes. Sometimes, rations intended for a field kitchen would have a whole tin of them for everyone. The legendary story goes that the Americans, who got Lucky Strikes in their rations, smoked them backward because if the enemy saw Lucky logos on discarded cigarette butts, they'd know the Americans were near. They tracked the Germans in a similar way because their butts had a little swastika on them, betraying their movements to the Allies. The Germans figured this out eventually, and everyone started smoking backward.
Filtered cigarettes were still largely unpopular until the 1950s, when ad campaigns started directing their sales at ladies, for reasons of not getting tobacco stuck in your teeth and dampening your nice smile. Sales of filters took off after that and were primarily thought of as a feminine thing, though why anyone would want brown shit on their teeth is beyond me. Eventually, they stopped gender-based marketing and started selling filtered smokes as "more healthy," which, of course, they were not, but filters had become the predominant style by the late '50s and early '60s. In 1965, all coffin nails were mandated to have the Surgeon General's warning on them, but it didn't really stop people from smoking as much as the Surgeon General, Luther Terry, had hoped, as the attitude at the time was "Okay, it's bad for me. I guess I do not care."
Fast forward to the modern day, the thought amongst government stooges is that "Hey, we’ll just raise the fuck out of cigarette taxes, and people will stop smoking!" This, however, did not happen. The demographic of smokers is typically people of lower income, and as we all know, poor people will never be without beer and smokes, so you've just picked Average Working-Class Joe's pocket. I'm sure he loves paying ten bucks for something that cost two dollars two decades ago; let the man smoke!
Lucky Strikes On every pack of Luckys, there is the acronym L.S./M.F.T. This is their way of saying, "Lucky Strike Means Fine Tobacco.". I'm not sure why there's a slash in there, but that is what it stands for. They used to have "It's Toasted" on their branding as well, which stemmed from an accident at the factory in 1917. There was a fire in the cigarette factory, but some of the tobacco was still good despite a little damage. They sorted through the crap and were going to call it a total loss, but a very clever person at the American Tobacco Company decided, "Let's just say it's toasted." This caught on, people liked them, and eventually they started deliberately heat-curing their leaf. It remains toasted to this day, but the phrase no longer appears on the packaging of their individual cigarette packs.
Chesterfield It is one of the most heavily advertised smokes in modern history and one of the most referenced in pop culture. Notable smokers of Chesterfields included Princess Margaret, Ronald Reagan, Humphrey Bogart, Lucille Ball, Rod Serling, and many others. In fact, while Lucille was a known chain smoker, she preferred the Phillip Morris brand, but she was contractually obligated to not ever be seen smoking anything but Chesterfields on screen. There is some irony in that Phillip Morris now owns the brand, and their own brand is defunct. However, she'd stick Phillip Morris fire sticks in a Chesterfield pack, and nobody knew the difference. During the original run of The Twilight Zone, ol' Rod Serling would sometimes advertise them at the end of an episode. They were referenced many times in many films, notably Grindhouse, where they were smoked by Kurt Russell's character, and of course, True Romance, where Dennis Hopper's character takes one from Christopher Walken after insulting him and knowing he's gonna get blasted. They also appear in Reservoir Dogs and in The Shawshank Redemption, as well as the Blues Brothers in several scenes. The most notable being when they state that it is 106 miles to Chicago, they have a full tank of gas and half a pack of cigarettes, it's dark, and they're wearing sunglasses. Hit it.
Parliaments Known for its distinctive half-hollow, short filter butt, it is the preferred cig of music nerd hipsters everywhere. However, the reason they did that is because filters were uncommon at the time, so they decided to make their product more appealing to the emerging market by half-assing it, quite literally. They are still made like that to this very day.
Virginia Slims and Capris Your grandma smoked these. If she said she didn't, she was lying. The only people who smoke these are grandmas and aging prostitutes. I hope your grandma wasn't both at once, but we all have a story to tell, I suppose.
Camel Camel Wides. They're often hard to find but don't get as stale as their other brands. The opposite of Virginia Slims, for people who like ‘em thicc.
Morleys A stand-in for a real pack of Marlboro reds, Morleys have been used as a prop for over 60 years, originating in Hitchcock's Psycho. They are also famous for being in The Twilight Zone, when actors needed prop cigarettes, and more famous in The X-Files, as they were what the Cigarette-Smoking Man preferred. However, in real life, actor Bill Davis was not a smoker, and when he smoked onscreen (which was, ya know, all the fucking time, or he'd be called the Sometimes-Cigarette-Smoking Man), he smoked herbal cigarettes with no tobacco in them. Morley packs are produced by a prop company called Earl Hayes Press, and many souvenir boxes can be found online if you want your own box in which to stick your cigs or whatever miscellany and look like a movie character.
Red Apples These faux smokes are typically found in Tarantino films but also appear in such odd places as Romy and Michele's High School Reunion. The character of Butch, played by Bruce Willis, famously orders a pack by name in Pulp Fiction, and most of the time in Quenty's films, if a character is smoking, they're smoking Red Apples. I could find little info on who designed the props, but replicas are readily available, as are signs advertising them.
That's our breakdown on the skinny of tobacco, in real life and in fiction. Whether you smoke or not, there's a storied history and one that has influenced the entire globe, for better or worse. I don't believe there is any country on Earth where you cannot find a pack of cigarettes if you care to have one. Smoke up, Johnny!
Enjoy life, and don't chain smoke in the gas station bathroom after taking the key while I'm waiting to chuck a brown trout.
–Wombstretcha
Wombstretcha the Magnificent is a Morley smoker, dubious historian, writer, and retired rapper from Portland, OR. He can be found at his website, Wombstretcha.com, on Twitter/X/whatever as @wombstretcha503, and on MeWe and (begrudgingly) Facebook as "Wombstretcha the Magnificent."
