M, Niko
Niko Moorshead
1 March 2018
Professor Roundtree
Art and Technology
The Evolution Of Cigarettes
It all started with the discovery of tobacco by Christopher Columbus October 15, 1492 after her sailed from Spain to modern day U.S. and gave it as to the king a gift from the native Americans(Source 1). Nobody knows how long the Natives had been smoking tobacco before other countries arrived and killed most of them, but it was estimated to be between 600-900A.D. This would be the beginning of tobacco introducing itself into western culture. Tobacco after this became a big export for the Great Britain and later the U.S.. Tobacco was a key element in the triangle trade, being sold to Europe and Africa for weapons and slaves. Most people smoked tobacco out of bowls.
Finally along came the invention of cigarettes. Nobody knows who the first person was to roll a cigarette, but we do know the “first commercial cigarettes were made in 1865 by Washington Duke on his 300-acre farm in Raleigh, North Carolina”(source 3). Before that an estimated 40 cigarettes were smoked a year. The invention of cigarettes also went very closely with the invention of the lighter by “Johann Wolfgang Döbereiner in 1823 and was often called Döbereiner's lamp”(source 2). As we all know, cigarettes grew into a multi billion dollar industry that had a majority of the adult population smoking them at a time. Cigarettes are still a popular item and worth billions of dollars, but the market is dying quickly thanks to a seemingly healthier, cleaner substitute.
The cigarette era’s fate was sealed in “2003: What would become the first commercially successful electronic cigarette is created in Beijing, China by Hon Lik, a 52 year old pharmacist, inventor and smoker”(source 4). The invention of electronic cigarettes made cigarettes almost obsolete. The younger and newer era have substituted E-cigs for cigarettes, and shows in the cigarette industry losses. Now, most college and high school use a “juul”, the most popular electronic cigarette.
I can honestly say that with future technology, the limit for substitutions is endless. There could be patches like we have now but more advanced, new solutions to contain more nicotine, put some in your water somehow? I would just stick with e-cigs or nothing at all. I don’t see how else nicotine could be consumed other than inhaling it. Maybe one that doesn’t make any smoke so it can’t be seen. I’m not sure what it will be next, but the history of nicotine consumption and the evolution of the cigarette has spanned thousands. Whatever is going to alter the market is unpredictable.
The reason I chose the evolution of cigarettes for this paper is actually because I use a juul now. While thinking of what to write about, I hit my juul and got the idea. It occured to me that both of my parents were smokers in their teenage and young adult years like many other student’s parents did. Just like my parents and all of their friends at my age, I use a device to get a nicotine buzz. I found it very interesting to think even further back to people in the 1800s smoking out of pipes or ancient Native American tribes smoking tobacco a millennia before anybody else knew they were there. The transformation through different inventions is unique because the inventions grew tobacco and nicotine products to such great heights, as well as becoming one of our greatest exports at a period in time. So the next time you see an individual smoking a cigarette of vaping a pen, think about the thousands of years that invention took to form.
Sources
Source 2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lighter
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