Smokin' Cigar Collectibles by Linda Rosenkrantz on Creators.com

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Smokin' Cigar Collectibles

Cigars sure ain't what they used to be. In terms of symbolic significance, at any rate.

Gone are the days, for example, when the cigar represented backroom politics and big-business boardrooms, when the ladies would have to leave the table so that the gentlemen could talk without inhibition over brandy and cigars.

Gone, too, are the days when little girls slipped colorful cigar bands over their ring fingers, pretending to be engaged to the boy they had a crush on.

But though these practices and associations may have vanished, remnants of them remain in the collecting world. Together with the paraphernalia for smoking cigarettes and pipes, chewing plug tobacco and sniffing snuff, cigar memorabilia is a significant part of the category known as tobaccoana.

Originally known as "segars," a name inspired by the Spanish cigar-shaped beetle cicada, the cigar is known to have existed in pre-Columbian Cuba. It was introduced into the United States by Gen. Israel Putnam in 1762, after the British campaign in Cuba. Some long, thin "stogies" (named after the Conestoga wagons) were made by the Pennsylvania Dutch around 1785, and by 1810, cigar-making was a Connecticut cottage industry.

In the early days, cigars were neither boxed nor banded. They were shipped in barrels containing multiples of 5,000 each. This changed in 1865, when a revenue act mandated that all cigars sold in the United States henceforth had to be boxed. It was around the same time that gilt and brightly lithographed bands, which served the dual purpose of identification and advertising, began to encircle the cigars.

Various explanations have been given for the origin of the cigar band, from British dandies wanting to protect their white gloves to Cuban ladies trying to avoid tobacco stains on their fingers. In any case, during the heyday of the cigar, from about 1880 to 1930, there was a minor rage for collecting cigar bands, as well as the decorative, finely lithographed labels removed from cigar boxes.

Often, they were pasted into scrapbooks or glued onto the bottoms of glass ashtrays. Particularly valuable today are specially printed giveaway bands used at conventions and meetings by such firms as Coca-Cola, as well as any cigar band or box with political associations or ties to other notables who had their own cigars specially made and labeled.

An indispensable accessory for the cigar aficionado was the cigar cutter, used to clip the sealed end from cigars. They came in two basic forms: the counter type found in every tobacco shop and in most general stores, and those made for individual use, many of which were extremely elaborate, sometimes made of sterling silver, gold and even embedded with precious jewels. Two major producers of fine cigar cutters were the Brunhoff Manufacturing Co. of Cincinnati and the Erie Specialty Co. of Erie, Pa.

There were personal cutters made to sit on the gentleman's desk and smaller ones to be carried in the pocket. Desk models came in a wide variety of shapes and forms, including animals, owls, cannons and crying babies. Most pocket cutters consisted of a small metal case with a hole in one side for the insertion of the cigar tip. When it was inserted, a blade behind the hole was activated to cut off the tip. Another type operated more like a pair of scissors, the cutting blade being operated by closing together two finger inserts.

There are several different routes for the cigar collector to take — among them: wooden mold for making cigars, a wide variety of humidors, advertising and promotional material, cigar box openers and for the really ambitious, "cigar store Indians," whose history dates back to 17th-century Europe, where carved countertop figures dressed in kilts made of tobacco leaves were used to promote tobacco sales.

Linda Rosenkrantz has edited Auction magazine and authored 18 books, most recently "Beyond Ava & Aidan: The Enlightened Guide to Naming your Baby" (St. Martin's Press). Visit her baby names website at http://nameberry.com. She cannot answer letters personally. To find out more about Linda Rosenkrantz and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.