I buy to display and preserve.

That means I want items as good or better than what you see here in my Museum.

    • Informative or interesting items in fine condition;

    • Items worthy of display;

    • Items that illustrate some facet of the industry story;

    • Cigar items with their own interesting story.

I buy a wide range of things but

only one category is detailed and linked so far:

Tax Stamps Wanted

US and Canada

Information about other wants can be found at right.

Most Wanted

1. 1.Tobacco Trade Directories
   

2. 2.Cuban Presidential boxes
   

3. 3.Firecracker shaped box
   

4. 4.Ads offering premiums
   

5. 5.Canadian Series C stamps
   

6. 6.Anything cigar from 1700’s
   

7. 7.ASTHMA CURE box
   

8. 8.High denomination tax stamps
   

9. 9.Novelty railroad train box
   

10. 10. Boxes from before 1875
    

11. 11. Sheet music not exhibited
    

12. 12.Photo WWI cigarette train
    

13. 13. PUCK 1877 w/Gompers illus
    

   How to Sell to NCM

Describe your item fully.

Send a low res jpg scan or photo whenever appropriate.

    tony@cigarhistory.info

Interesting shaped boxes are always wanted no matter where made. This truck box held 100 Dutch cigars.

PHOTOGRAPHS

I buy or accept as donations photos related to cigars from all periods, if they’re interesting and sharp:

    •  Cigar factories, stores, warehouses inside and out;

    •  Parade floats, window displays and other promotions;

    •  Delivery wagons, cars and trucks;

    •  Cigar salesmen;

    •  Women and children cigar smokers;

    •  Photo of “cigarette train” of boxcars loaded with cigarettes for    

            troops in WWI;

CIGAR BOXES

I buy rare and unusual boxes in very fine condition, as good or better than what you see exhibited. Lids do not have to be attached; about half the boxes made before 1880 have their lids separated. It’s not serious if the box is in otherwise excellent condition. I don’t buy greasy, painted or water-stained ‘fixer uppers.’

To judge condition of a cigar box click here.<Under construction>

I almost never buy duplicates. If you see a box exactly like yours on display, I probably don’t have room for another. Here are some examples of what I want.

•  $300 for the 1895-1900 box pictured left (blown up from a photo);

•  $500 to $3500 for inlaid Cuban chests marked “expresamente para”

           or “especiales para” someone important;

•  $500 for a FIRECRACKER shaped box;

•  $400 for ASTHMA CURE cigar box pre 1900;

•  $100 for ABC box depicting streetcar Akron, Bedford & Cleveland;

•  $$$ for boxes before 1874 in fine condition;

•  $$$ for boxes with printed photos of local events for labels;

•  $$$ for boxes with health claims from any period;

•  $$$ for boxes from Cuba, Florida or California from before 1898;

•  $$$ for some boxes from Factory 11, 3rd NY  (Straiton & Storm);

•  $$$ for some boxes from Factory 17, 2nd Virginia  (P.Lorillard);

•  $$$ for some boxes from Factory 50, 3rd NY  (Lichtenstein);

•  $$$ for pre-1916 boxes from Factory 202 in Indiana   (H.Fendrich);

•  $$$ for some boxes from Factory 212 in Ohio   (M & N);

Send a picture by pasting a low res jpg image into an email. Include

    [1] the top and front of the box

    [2] the inside lid and box clear enuff to read and

    [3] the bottom.

In addition to the photo, give the box’s ID (Factory, tax district, state and number of cigars).  What is the date of your box? If you don’t know how to date your box, click <here>.

If your box is from Cuba, how is the box marked ON THE BOTTOM?  Boxes from Honduras, Nicaragua, Canary Islands, Costa Rica, Jamaica are seldom of interest.

LABEL CATALOGS & SCRAPBOOKS

I buy:

    •  Labels in cigar label sample books or in scrapbooks.

    •  Collections of 19th century Cuban labels.

If your labels are framed, or come with certificates or guarantees,

I am not interested and, I’m sorry to say, can’t help you sell them.

If you bought your labels from a commercial company since 1970,

I am not interested and unable to help you resell them.

CIGAR BANDS

I buy bands, but only large collections mounted in attractive designs in albums. Collections of a few hundred bands mounted in notebooks or composition books are seldom of interest unless they are primarily pictorial and can be positively dated to the 1800’s. Low prices paid.

PRODUCTS FROM SAMUEL HYMAN

I buy fine condition boxes & cans from the S. Hyman tobacco and cigar factory in Montreal, Canada. His products are clearly marked with his name. Any box or can other than those pictured is wanted if in fine condition. Reasonable prices, please.   [DN8828]

ANYTHING FROM HENRY J. VEITH, Rochester, NY

I want anything from cigar business of Henry J. Veith, located at 583 North Clinton (and perhaps elsewhere) in Rochester in the 1870’s, 1880’s and 90’s. His Factory was Fact 585, 28th Dist NY. He was a cigar maker, wholesaler and dealer in tobacco leaf. He was also my maternal grandmother’s uncle who met her at the boat when she came unaccompanied from Germany at age 14 in 1884. Grandma “didn’t like his looks” so ran away with a family going to South Dakota. Henry was persistent and eventually caught up to her and brought her home where photos suggest she had a good time with Henry’s teen-age daughters, but at 18 ran away again, this time to California. Henry didn’t chase her. Grandma was a tough old bird.

GOVERNMENT DOCUMENTS

Tax regulations, congressional committee reports, letters, opinions, census data... if it came from the government and pertains to cigars from any year 1760 to 2000 I’ll probably buy it.

CATALOGS

Catalogs before 1930 from cigar, cigar box, cigar machinery or cigar label companies are wanted. Others considered.

BILLS, LETTERS, LEDGERS & RECORDS

•  Business letters before 1920 illustrated with a building, machine,

        delivery wagon, factory interior, or box of cigars...or

        something else having to do with cigars; 

•  Business records of a cigar factory, wholesaler or retailer;

•  Postcards, trade cards, insert cards;

•  Ledgers of a home industry;

•  Ledgers of a tobacco grower, 1800’s.

PERSONAL LETTERS

•  Personal accounts 1760-1960 of tobacco buying trips, sales trips, testing equipment, bad or good experiences, new techniques, etc. ...  any document or printed account which sheds light on a cigar event or process from a personal standpoint. 

I own, for example: a girl confessing she rolled a mouse carcass into a cigar on her last day at work, another from a cigar machinery salesman telling how a clever burglar robbed his hotel room, descriptions of tobacco buying at Amsterdam markets, a buying trip to Cuba, a salesman offering some of the first cigars H.Upmann made in 1845, a three-pager on how to set up a branch office for a distributor, etc.

That’s the sort of interesting content I want.

NCM Home 

Write the Curator: <Tony@CigarHistory.info>

Not Wanted

1. 1.Greasy or waterstained boxes;
   

2. 2.No box missing its lid;
   

3. 3.Boxes that have been painted;
   

4. 4.Boxes with varnished labels;
   

5. 5.Tobacco pocket tins;
   

6. 6.Boxes made in Jamaica, Honduras, Canary Islands, or Dominican Republic;
   

7. 7.Boxes made after 1960;
   

8. 8.Boite nature boxes.
   

Send long SASE for free list

of cigar brands not wanted.

Box 3000

    Pismo Beach, CA 93448

I bought this.

SOME SHEET MUSIC TITLES WE WANT

The Museum wants to buy any sheet music you don’t see in our exhibit (and some you do see) if it relates to cigars or cigarettes in a similar manner. I can only list missing titles with which I am familiar...and I learn of new ones regularly. So please ask if you think you might have something we’d like to exhibit.

      • Free and Easy (published in 1825)

      • A Smokin' His Cigar (published late 1860s)

      • I Don't See Your Name Stamped on Any Cigar  (illus.)

      • Oh, that Box of Cigars!

      • Old Abe  (illustrated)

      • His Cigar  (illustrated)

      • John Hay March  (illustrated)

      • UNITUS (with cigar advertising)

      • The Boys of Company B only with all 3 songs  (illustrated)

      • Mother’s Got the Habit Now

      • Mr. Churchill's Cigar  (published in 1954)

      • Smoke, Smoke, Smoke that Cigarette

      • Cigarettes will Kill You & some other cigarette songs.

1905              1930                1951