but a small portion of this was produced in Rock and 

 Dane Counties. 



The two original farmers in Rock County had experi- 

 mentally planted cigar-leaf tobacco using seeds then 

 readily available in Ohio. The high quality of their crops 

 suggested to other farmers that the soil of Wisconsin was 

 especially suitable for cigar-leaf tobacco. Various impor- 

 tations of seeds into the state began to take place. 



A Janes ville farmer acquired Connecticut- Havana 

 seed from Massachusetts in 1872. The resulting variety, 

 known as Comstock Spanish, was soon being widely pro- 

 duced in the Wisconsin area where it was first grown. 

 There were other importations of seeds of types growing 

 around Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and in Connecticut. 

 The older Wisconsin seedleaf tobacco developed from 

 the latter was long locally called "Housatonic" or "Big- 

 seed" to differentiate it from Havana varieties. 



Fe 



arm economy and development 



Just before 1880, when the agriculture of tobacco in 

 various Wisconsin districts had become standardized, 

 the records of a successful farmer, Thomas Hutson of 

 Edgerton, showed that the cost of operation— cultivating, 

 curing and marketing— for each acre of seedleaf tobacco 

 averaged $61.25. He obtained 1,600 pounds of tobacco, 

 as a rule, from each acre. As this produce was sold for 

 $112 an acre, the profit was described as "handsome." 



All but a few tobacco farms, particularly in northern 

 areas where the major occupation was dairying, were 

 small, usually one to four acres. These farms, chiefly 

 operated by Scandinavians, so increased in extent that 



