A History of America in Cigar Consumption

[M1903A1]

Originally Posted by Cigary

That graph is really something to see as I would have thought back in the first of the century that cigar smoking wasn't all that prevalent.

Au contraire! It was once very prevalent.

From what I've read cigars did not seriously begin to be superseded by cigarettes (in the US at least) until after large numbers of American men were introduced to them in the trenches of World War I.

[Neuromancer]

Originally Posted by M1903A1

Au contraire! It was once very prevalent.

From what I've read cigars did not seriously begin to be superseded by cigarettes (in the US at least) until after large numbers of American men were introduced to them in the trenches of World War I.

The switch from cigars to cigarettes came primarily with the invention of the automatic cigarette rolling machines which made it possible to provide them in mass quantities and at cheaper prices, somewhere around the turn of the 19th to the 20th century...

[Tredegar]

I agree with the size of cigars being smaller a century ago. If you look at almost any picture of guys smoking cigars from then, they are almost all smaller ring gauges. Also, I have seen a prevalence of smaller ring gauge perfectos that people were smoking. The advent of cigarettes did lower cigar consumption especially when you think about how many people were also employed in factories and didn't have time to smoke a cigar but did have time for a quick cigarette.