Nebraska Cigar Boxes

Cigar making and cigar smoking in Nebraska reached their pinnacle shortly after the turn of the century. Then more than two hundred cigar makers in the state produced nearly thirty million cigars each year. Cigars declined in popularity as World War I, and then the 1920s, saw the rise in cigarette smoking. 



Many of these early cigar “factories” were actually cottage industries located in a home or perhaps an adjoining shed. Two or three people made cigars by hand, using wooden molds. However, not all cigar manufacturing was done on such a small scale, even in Nebraska. In 1916 Hastings had six cigar factories producing seven million cigars per year. The Kipp Cigar Company, founded in 1909, by 1925 was making ten million cigars annually. Another Hastings cigar factory, the Evans-Bloom Cigar Company, was established in 1905 and by the 1920s claimed to be the largest cigar factory in Nebraska.

These Nebraska cigar boxes are just a few from the Charles Tuthill collection that were recently donated to the Society.