FLUE-CURED TOBACCO. 67 
and that of the New Belt is about 95,000,000 pounds, making 215,000,- 
000 pounds as the total annual production of tobacco of the flue-cured 
type. 
Other important contributory causes for the rapid expansion of 
tobacco growing into the New Belt section in the decade mentioned 
was the rapid development and expansion in the demand for and con- 
sumption of granulated smoking tobacco and in the use of cigarettes, 
also the rapidly expanding foreign demand resulting in good prices 
for this type of leaf. This combination, therefore, of low prices for 
cotton and high prices for tobacco is the most important contributory 
cause of the rapid development of tobacco growing in the New Belt 
section. 
A comparison of the census returns of 1890 with those of 1900 for 
the New Belt section of eastern North Carolina and South Carolina 
strikingly illustrates the rapid extension of tobacco growing in that 
decade. In 1890 the total production of the counties reporting 
tobacco in eastern North Carolina and South Carolina was 1,604,304 
pounds, of which 1,381,406 pounds were in eastern North Carolina 
and 222,898 pounds in South Carolina. Of the total eastern North 
Carolina production more than half, 782,713 pounds, was produced 
in Nash County directly bordering the section designated as the Old 
Belt. Only two other counties in this section produced more than 
100,000 pounds of tobacco each. They were Wilson and Wayne 
Counties with 232,966 and 112,010 pounds production, respectively. 
The figures for the 1900 census show an amazing increase in this 
section. From less than 2,000,000 pounds total production of 
tobacco shown by the 1890 census, the figures for 1900 gave the New 
Belt section a production of 79,603,610 pounds, of which 59,707,640 
pounds were produced in eastern North Carolina and 19,895,970 
pounds in South Carolina. This great extension in production car- 
ried North Carolina ahead of Virginia and made it second only to 
Kentucky in total production of tobacco, which relative position the 
State has since continued to hold. 
The maps (Pls. I and II, in pocket) show the approximate limits of 
the established producing territory for the flue-cured type of tobacco 
in 1909. The line separating the flue-cured type from the dark-fired 
type in Virginia is of course only an approximation. No definite line 
exists showing where one begins and the other ends. What really 
exists is a belt of country upon which can be found either type here 
and there, according to the character of the soil and the preference of 
the grower. 
THE OLD BELT SECTION. 
Table XVII gives a list of the counties in the Old Belt section of 
Virginia, North Carolina, and Tennessee that produce tobacco in 
important commercial quantities, with an estimate of the quantity 
244 
