Tobacco
2 of the 7 encyclopedias on this shelf carry an entry for Tobacco. Both are reproduced below, so you can see where they agree and where they differ.
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
a narcotic plant, the leaves of which are used for smoking, chewing, and as snuff. Columbus, Drake, Sir Walter Raleigh, and other early discoverers found it in use among the American Indians who smoked the leaves, not only socially and individually, but in the ceremonial pipe of peace and around their council fires. The practice was introduced into Europe and became general in spite of determined opposition in high quarters. Pope Urban VIII went to the length of excommunicating tobacco users, and no less a personage than King James I issued a "counterblast" against the weed. Tobacco was the first crop to bring money to the settlers of the New World. The prospect of tobacco shipments played an important part in colonization. The principal business of Maryland and Virginia with the mother country, from the purchase of a harpsichord or a wife to a roll of cloth or an implement, was transacted in terms of tobacco and payment was made in tobacco. The Southern colonial planter packed his tobacco in hogsheads. A hogshead was laid on its side, fitted with a pair of shafts, and trundled off like a farm roller to the nearest river landing. At the close of the American Revolution, the new states were able to ship 118,460 hogsheads of tobacco leaf in a single year, 1790. Over 100,000 American farmers raise tobacco as a chief crop. Leaf tobacco brings prices varying from two cents to two dollars a pound, according to kind and quality, the latter price being for wrapper leaves of a quality difficult to obtain. Tobacco is everywhere an annual. It grows shoulder high, with broad, ovate, oily, heavy-scented leaves, arranged on a strong stem. The large leaves near the ground attain a length of eighteen inches and a width of six. Its culture is not very different from that of cabbages. A dry, warm, deep, rich, sandy soil is best. Like the grape, tobacco is sensitive to soil and surroundings. The plants are started from seed in a specially prepared and sheltered plot. They are transplanted to the field later on and are worked like corn. Imperfect leaves are removed. The top is cut off that the strength of the plant may center in eight or ten of the lower leaves. As the leaves approach maturity, they are cured by undergoing a sweating process and are baled for market. Prior to the Civil War Virginia led the Union in the production of tobacco, and Richmond is still a large tobacco center. Named in order of amount produced, the leading ten states are now Kentucky, North Carolina , Virginia, Ohio, Tennessee, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Maryland, South Carolina , and Connecticut. The United States is now the chief tobacco-producing and consuming country of the world. The yield reported for the year of the last census reached the enormous total of 863,163,275 pounds, of which Kentucky and the territory tributary to Frankfort and Cincinnati raised a half, Virginia and the Carolinas nearly one-third, and the rest of the Union the remainder. The Connecticut Valley raises a tobacco celebrated for cigar wrappers. A section of Wisconsin raises tobacco profitably. The wornout fields of North Carolina have sprung into notice as producers of a certain variety of mild tobacco. Lands supposed to be of little value yield large returns. A small green variety is raised quite generally in the Northern States for private consumption as smoking tobacco. It has little or no commercial value. Mexico is a large producer of tobacco. Cuban tobacco is noted for its flavor and is much used in the manufacture of cigars. The entire Caribbean region produces luxuriant tobacco. The Manila product has a wide reputation. Tobacco raising has spread rapidly in Europe. Turkish tobacco is celebrated. Hungary raises a large amount. The United States imports some of the more expensive grades of tobacco, especially Sumatra leaves for cigar wrappers and fillers, but our exports of leaf tobacco, chiefly to Canada and the countries of Western Europe from Gibraltar to Hammerfest, amount to 300,000,000 pounds, a full third of the annual crop. Tobacco is a source of national wealth. Large value in tobacco leaf is easily transported at so little expense that tobacco manufacturing is not confined to tobacco-raising districts. The growth of the tobacco industry has been rapid. The Indians raised small patches practically everywhere east of the great plains. In 1612 John Rolfe cultivated tobacco in his garden at Jamestown. In 1618 the colony produced 20,000 pounds. The American production in 1621 was 60,000 pounds; in 1640, 1,300,000 pounds; in 1680, 25,000,000 pounds; in 1770, 107, 391,000 pounds; in 1776, 2,440,947 pounds; in 1839, 219,000,000 pounds; in 1859, 434,000,000 pounds; in 1862, 163,000,000 pounds; and in 1900, 814,000,000 pounds. The American production of tobacco, according to the Year Book for 1908 was: Acres. Pounds. New Hampshire . . . . . 99 178,200 Vermont . . . . . 200 347,000 Massachusetts . . . . . 4,512 7,444,800 Connecticut . . . . . 13,824 23,224,320 New York . . . . . 6,177 7,257,975 Pennsylvania . . . . . 29,440 39,008,000 Maryland . . . . . 26,000 18,200,000 Virginia . . . . . 140,000 114,100,000 West Virginia . . . . . 6,200 4,650,000 North Carolina . . . . . 200,000 134,000,000 South Carolina . . . . . 29,000 25,085,000 Georgia . . . . . 2,775 2,705,625 Florida . . . . . 5,625 5,568,750 Ohio . . . . . 50,400 33,768,000 Indiana . . . . . 12,450 8,715,000 Illinois . . . . . 1,500 1,132,500 Wisconsin . . . . . 35,000 39,550,000 Missouri . . . . . 2,500 2,187,500 Kentucky . . . . . 240,000 195,600,000 Tennessee . . . . . 65,000 52,000,000 Alabama . . . . . 630 283,500 Mississippi . . . . . 100 25,000 Louisiana . . . . . 102 86,700 Texas . . . . . 3,000 2,400,000 Arkansas . . . . . 891 543,510 United States . . . . . 875,425 718,061,380 It is difficult to get accurate statistics owing to the consumption on the farm. Some countries, as China and Persia, have no system of gathering statistics. The following figures for the crop of 1907 are offered by the United States Department of Agriculture: Pounds. United States . 698,126,000 Porto Rico 13,000,000 Canada 3,107,000 Cuba 51,505,000 Guatemala 1,300,000 Mexico 22,750,000 Santo Domingo 26,400,000 Argentina 31,000,000 Bolivia 3,000,000 Brazil 64,256,000 Chile 6,000,000 Ecuador 122,000 Paraguay 10,000,000 Peru 1,500,000 Austria-Hungary 158,895,000 Belgium 19,476,000 Bulgaria 14,171,000 Denmark 160,000 France 40,810,000 Germany 61,665,000 Greece 7,700,000 Italy 14,494,000 Netherlands 1,700,000 Roumania 15,554,000 Russia 226,258,000 Servia 3,208,000 Sweden 2,661,000 Turkey (including Asiatic) 100,000,000 British India 450,000,000 Borneo 300,000 Java 67,088,000 Sumatra, East coast of 47,363,000 Japanese Empire 104,762,000 Philippine Islands 40,056,000 Africa 23,194,000 Australia 1,482,000 Fiji 44,000 Oceania 1,526,000 Total . . . . . 2,333,107,000 In some years the world produces 3,000,000,000 pounds of tobacco. The United States, Cuba, Mexico, Turkey, Egypt, the Philippines, the Transvaal, and the Dutch East Indies, are the exporting countries; Great Britain, the Netherlands, and Germany are the heavy buyers. The sale of tobacco is a government monopoly in France, Italy, Spain, and Austria-Hungary. The habit of using tobacco may be regarded as well-nigh universal. The per capita consumption of tobacco in the different countries varies, as may be seen from the following table, showing the total and per capita consumption in the principal countries during the most recent available year: Total consumption. Per capital consumption. Pounds. Pounds. United States . . . . . 440,000,000 5.40 Germany . . . . . 201,783,000 3.44 Russia . . . . . 150,244,000 1.10 France . . . . . 84,393,000 2.16 United Kingdom . . . . . 83,378,000 1.95 Austria . . . . . 78,755,000 3.02 Hungary . . . . . 47,905,000 2.42 Belgium . . . . . 44,273,000 6.21 Italy . . . . . 34,549,000 1.05 Canada . . . . . 15,400,000 2.74 Mexico . . . . . 18,870,000 1.39 Australia . . . . . 10,158,000 2.59 See Pipe ; Cigar ; France ; Nicotine ; Narcotics; Opium ; Betel ; Hashish 2026 Editor's Note: Tobacco's corporate empire broke the year after these volumes — the American Tobacco antitrust decision (1911) — while the cigarette, still slightly disreputable here, was about to conquer via the World War's ration kits. See American Tobacco . (Ed: BR 2026-06-25)
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
a very important plant, belonging to the natural order Atropaceœ, or night-shade order. The introduction of the use of tobacco forms a singu- TOBACCO PLANT lar chapter in the history of mankind. According to some authorities smoking was practised by the Chinese at a very early date. At the time of the discovery of America, tobacco was in frequent use among the Indians, and the practice of smoking, which had with them a religious character, was common to almost all the tribes (see CALUMET). The name of tobacco was either derived from the term used in Haiti to designate the pipe, or from Tabaca in Santo Domingo, whence it was introduced into Spain and Portugal in 1559 by a Spaniard. It soon found its way to Paris and Rome, and was first used in the shape of snuff. Smoking is generally supposed to have been introduced into England by Sir Walter Raleigh, but Camden says the practice was introduced by Drake and his companions on their return from Virginia in 1585. It was strongly opposed by both priests and rulers. Pope Urban VIII. and Innocent XI. issued bulls excommunicating such as used snuff in church, and in Turkey smoking was made a capital offense. In the canton of Bern the prohibition of the use of tobacco was put among the 10 commandments immediately after that forbidding adultery. The "Counterblast" or_denunciation written by James I. of England is a matter of history. All prohibitions, however, regal or priestly, were of no avail, and tobacco is now the most extensively used luxury on the face of the earth. The most commonly cultivated tobacco plant (Nicotiana tabacum) is glutinous, and covered with a very short down; the stem upright, four or five feet high, and branching; the leaves are lanceolate, from 6 to 18 inches long; the flowers are terminal and rose-colored. A less esteemed species is N. rustica, distinguished by a short yellowish-green corolla. The best Havana cigars are made from the leaves of N. repanda. All the tobacco plants are natives of America, and that continent has continued the principal producer, the chief tobacco-growing country being the United States, and the chief localities being Virginia and Kentucky. It was first cultivated in Holland early in the 17th century, and soon extended to other countries, including Austria, Germany, Russia, the Balkan Peninsula, Asiatic Turkey, France, Brit ish India, Cuba, Brazil, the Philippine Islands, Japan, and Australia. The cultivation in Great Britain was forbidden from an early date till 1866, when it was permitted under certain conditions. Tobacco owes its principal properties to the presence of a most poisonous alkaloid named NICOTINE (q. v.). In the manufacture of tobacco the leaves are first thoroughly cleansed with salt and water. The midrib of the leaf is then removed; the leaves are again sorted, and the large ones set apart for making cigars. The leaves may either be cut finely for use in pipes, as is the case with "shag" tobacco, or they are moistened and pressed into cakes, which are designated cavendish; or they are pressed into sticks. as negrohead; or again the leaves may be spun in the form of a rope of greater or less thickness; the smallest twist is called pigtail. The midribs, separated in the first process of manufacture, are preserved to be converted into SNUFF (q. v.). Cigars, cigarettes, and cheroots are favorite forms of manufactured tobacco. As the best leaf is grown in Cuba, so also are the best cigars made there. The leaf used for the manufacture of Manila cheroots is grown chiefly on the island of Luzon. The production of tobacco in the United States in 1920 was 1,476,444,000 pounds.