| ha ha ha ha! My oral presentation for History class tomorow! I hope it goes well ^-^
Hello, I am here today to tell you a history on North Carolina’s most profitable crop, tobacco. As you may know, tobacco isn’t used just for cigarettes, it’s also used for snuff, pipe smoking, cigars, and chewing tobacco. North Carolina grows the two main types of tobacco, Bright Leaf tobacco, and Burley tobacco. Others not grown in North Carolina are Cigar filler, binder & wrapper tobacco, Maryland tobacco, light air-cured tobacco, dark air-cured tobacco, Louisiana Perique, and fire-cured tobacco.
After serving in the Confederate Army for the last two years of the War Between the States, or, the "Civil War", Washington Duke returned home to the Duke Homestead with four motherless children, a tobacco barn, a mule, fifty cents, and the land as his sole possessions. Fortunately for his financial state, the Union troops found a taste for bright leaf tobacco washington had been growing on his farm; soon Washington began selling it off the farm. Taking the manufactured leaf on a peddling trip into eastern North Carolina, Washington sold much in small towns and villages all across the coast.
Following his profitable sales trip, Washington Duke began the manufacture of smoking tobacco on a part time basis. Though farming tobacco, wheat, corn, oats and other subsistence crops took up much of the family’s time, the Dukes were able to manufacture 15,000 pounds of their product, "Pro Bono Publico", (as it was named) during the year 1866. The increase in production demanded the utilization of other buildings on the farm, including an old stable, known as the second factory. Soon, Duke began buying additional tobacco from neighboring farmers.
Though it was difficult to make a large profit on manufactured tobacco due to the high federal revenue tax placed on it, the Duke country enterprise continued to grow steadily in the late 1860s. As the market for Duke’s tobacco expanded, so did the prices for "Pro Bono Publico" in the next few years.
In 1868 Washington Duke gave his son, Brodie Duke his blessing to open up a new factory in Durham. Around that time, washington began to concentrate more heavily on the manufacture of tobacco. He constructed a two-story frame building (known as the third factory) and hired additional workers to handle the increased production. By 1873, the Dukes were producing around 125,000 pounds of smoking tobacco annually.
As the enterprise steadily expanded, and the number of customers outside of North Carolina increased, washington Duke began to consider the advantages of moving his business into town. The location of the North Carolina railroad station was convenient for shipping, and a warehouse for the sale of leaf tobacco had been opened in 1871. In April 1874, Duke purchased two acres near the railroad where he built a new factory.
The shift to Durham and construction of the new factory there marked the beginning of a large-scale tobacco company, which climbed gradually to the top of the industry. Washington Duke’s sons took a more active role in the family establishment. Brodie, who had gained experience as a manufacturer during his four years in town, moved his business into one wing of the new town factory. Benjamin and Buck Duke were given equal partnerships and assumed much of the responsibility for company operation. Washington traveled throughout the country, concentrating his efforts on promotion of the company’s products.
By now, Washington Duke was one of the wealthiest men in Orange County and was fast emerging as a leading citizen of Durham. A great concern of Duke’s was the stiff competition from the other tobacco operations in the town. The old established leader was John R Green’s successor, W. T. Blackwell and Company, with its "Bull Durham" smoking tobacco. The dukes invited a new partner, George W. Watts of Baltimore, to join the firm in 1878 and renamed the business "W. Duke, Sons and Company".
Although W Duke, Sons and Company enjoyed a healthy trade in smoking tobacco, the keen rivalry with W. T. Blackwell and Company finally prompted the Dukes to begin the manufacture of cigarettes in 1881. The practice of using cigarettes had spread from the European countries to the United States around 1860. The manufacture of cigarettes extended southward to Virginia and North Carolina in the 1870s and 1880s.
Early hand methods used in cigarette production were slow and tedious; an expert could roll only about four per minute. W. Duke, Sons and Company and the other firms were forced to hire migrants from the eastern Europe who were skilled in cigarette making. As cigarettes grew in popularity, tobacco companies began the search for a mechanical method of manufacturing them rapidly. Around 1877, the Allen and Ginter Company of Richmond, Virginia offered $75,000 to any person who could invent a practical cigarette-making machine. Such a machine was developed in 1880 by eighteen-year-old James Bonsack; Allen and Ginter installed the machine in their factory, but discarded it as a failure after several trials.
Believing that the new Bonsack machine eventually would eliminate hand processing of cigarettes, Buck Duke, in the spring of 1884, went to New York to establish a branch of the company there. This relieved the overburdened Durham factory and enabled the firm to gain a foothold in the national center of commerce and world trade.
W. Duke, Sons and Company was becoming the leading cigarette producer in the
country. Increased advertising efforts enabled the firm to outsell its competitors. One journalist later noted that James B. Duke ‘was always an aggressive advertiser, devising new and startling methods which dismayed his competitors and was always willing to spend in advertising a proportion of his profits which seemed appalling to more conservative manufacturers"
By the mid-1800s Buck Duke felt that a merger of all large-scale tobacco manufacturers would be a practical way of reducing selling an advertising costs as well as improving overall organization. The four most important competitors of the Duke firm at tat time were the Allen and Ginter Company of Richmond, the F. S. Kinney Company and the Goodwin Company both of New York, and William S. Kimball and company of Rochester. These and the Duke company manufactured 90% of the nation’s cigarettes in the 1880s. After discussing the merger, and following a period of excessive spending on advertising, the large rival firms agreed that the Dukes’ plan of merger was the most sensible proposal. In 1890, the five principal companies united to form the American Tobacco Company. The combination quickly became known as the "tobacco trust", because of its almost complete monopoly of the tobacco trade.
Washington and Benjamin long ago had established a pattern of giving money to support the Methodist school, Trinity College, in Durham. James Duke continued the tradition when, in 1924, the Duke Endowment was created for the benefit of his native region. In gratitude, Trinity College changed its name to Duke University, as it is known today.
Now, I must turn your audience over to my brother, where he will explain to you what we will be doing on our tour of the Duke Homestead. Thank you.
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