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TOBACCO PRODUCTION IN THE UNITED STATES. 



CROPS OF INDIANA. 



The figures in the following table for the years 187C, 1877, and 1878 are based on information derived mainly 

 from the state bureau of statistics, and may be relied on as very nearly correct. The production, acreage, and 

 yield per acre for 1879 are from the returns of the census of 1880. The value in primary markets, value per pound, 

 and value per acre are ascertained from schedules returned to this office and other data : 



Of the tobacco produced in Indiana iu 1879, 746,298 pounds are estimated to be of the seed-leaf variety, 

 23,800 of the White Bin-ley type, and the remainder of the Regie sorts, including heavy cutters, air-cured for 

 manufacturing, and stogie tillers, classed as heavy tobacco. 



CHAPTER VII. 

 CULTURE AND CURING OF TOBACCO IN KENTUCKY. 



Kentucky takes the first rank as a tobacco-growing state, producing more than double the quantity of any 

 other state, and more than one-third of the entire amount produced in the Union. The crops for the census years 

 from 1840 were as follows : 



Pounds. 



1840 5:5,436,909 



18, r )0 55,501,1% 



18^0 108,1-26,840 



1870 105,305,869 



1880 171,1-20,784 



Virginia took the first rank up to 1870, when Kentucky took the lead. Probably the largest and the best crop 

 ever produced in the state was that of 1877. The production then reached 181,484,030 pounds, while for 1870 and 

 1875 the production was, respectively, 120,907,449 and 148,319,429 pounds. The entire area covered by the crop 

 for 1879 (226,120 acres) shows an average yield per acre of 756.77 pounds. The area of its cultivation is widening 

 every year, extending into the mountainous districts on the east and contracting the limits of the blue-grass region 

 in the central portion, of the state. 



HISTOET. 



In 1785 General Wilkinson, of Lexington, Kentucky, entered into a contract with the Spanish government 

 in Louisiana to deliver several boat-loads of tobacco in New Orleans. Whether the tobacco he delivered was 

 grown on the Ohio river or in the Spanish settlements on the Mississippi river is uncertain. Probably some of it 

 was produced in Kentucky, for Mr. Wailes, former state geologist of Mississippi, after speaking of the production 

 of the crop in that state, even as early as 1783, says: 



It is certain, from some cause, either from fraud iu packing, the falling off in quality, or from the competition of Kentucky tobacco, 

 introduced into New Orleans under General Wilkinson's contracts with the Spanish authorities, or by their connivance, the price was so 

 reduced that the further cultivation of it in Mississippi for exportation was, in a few years, wholly abandoned. 



The early cultivation of tobacco iu the West, and its progressive development, have never been made subjects 

 of record. Being a commodity of small local consumption, and dependent chietiy for its value upon foreign demand, 

 the early growers were without adequate markets at home, and were forced to rely upon a rude navigation to reach, 

 the seaboard. It was by far the most profitable crop which could be grown, and almost the only one which would 

 command ready money at all times when placed in market. 



The culture of tobacco in Kentucky was begun as a business by the early settlers from the old tobacco states, 

 and notably by those from Virginia. It is well known that about, the year 1H10 it was grown in marketable quantity 

 at several points in the southern and central portions of the state. During that year John Small and Edinoud 

 Curd, from Virginia, and in 1812 Martin Eogan, from the same state, and Thomas Morrow, from North Carolina, 



settled in Logan county, and commenced the cultivation of tobacco. The crops grown by these persons were 

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