W A N T E D
The Museum Wants to Buy
 
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, that illustrate some part of industry story or come with their own story.
 
I buy a wide range of things.
Only one category is detailed and linked so far, because it’s a long boring specialized list.
 
Tax Stamps Wanted
US and Canada
 
 
All the other information you need is here on your right.
 
 
 
Top Ten
Most Wanted
  1. 1.Tobacco Trade Directories
  2. 2.Cuban Presidential boxes
  3. 3.Firecracker shaped box
  4. 4.1863 US cigar tax stamp
  5. 5.Canadian Series C stamps
  6. 6.Anything cigar from 1700’s
  7. 7.ASTHMA CURE box
  8. 8.CREMO 1929-30 spit ads
  9. 9.Novelty railroad train box
  10. 10. Boxes from before 1875
 
 
 
   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.
TRADE DIRECTORIES
 
Directories are state by state, city by city, lists of cigar factories, tobacco factories, cigarette factories, etc. These books were published annually since the 1860's. Usually hard cover except for around 1930. Can have as many as 600 pages.
 
I WILL BUY ANY YEAR before 1960 IN ANY CONDITION INCLUDING MISSING COVER OR MISSING PAGES.
 
Directories are also found that list the cigar factories in just one state or city. I buy these too.
NEWSPAPERS & MAGAZINES
 
I also buy newspapers or magazines with accounts related to cigar factories, cigar labor disputes, etc., prior to 1900. I'll buy papers with ads for cigars prior to 1850, including classifieds, or notices of ships landed with cigar cargo put up for auction. Especially:
 
•  All newspapers & prints from 1700's that mention cigars in any way;
•  Papers, magazines or print pre-1860 with cigars in ads, editorial or news;
•  LONDON MAGAZINE for May 1820. cigar quality and fraud;
•  ILLUSTRATED LONDON NEWS, Jan 16th, 1864 p 66 (xerox of story about
            cigar butt selling will do)
•  LESLIE’S from early 1870’s with Samuel Gompers cartoon bustling about;
•  WASP from 1890’s with color illustration of Chinaman and cigar boxes;
•  THE HUB for January 1892;
•  Pre-1920 foreign satires & illus about cigar making, selling or smoking;
•  Any mag, late 1920’s ad for CREMO saying they are not made with spit;
•  COLLIER’S for July 13, 1946 (for brief note about 8 foot long cigar);
•  Any mag, 1970’s? ad selling plastic duck with cigars sticking up from back;
•  LADIES HOME JOURNAL, Dec. 1908
•  TOBACCO, TOBACCO WORLD, TOBACCO LEAF magazines
•  INTERNAL REVENUE RECORD, all 1865-1878, exp. #89 (Sept. 15, 1866),
 
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 photographs 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.
CIGAR LABEL CATALOGS & SCRAPBOOKS
 
I buy or accept as donations:
•  Labels in 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 and 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 No. 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 will probably buy it.
CATALOGS
 
I’m always in the market for catalogs before 1930 from cigar, cigar box, cigar machinery or cigar label companies. Others considered.
BUSINESS 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;  
•  Multi-year 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 1800-1950 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.
 
 
TAX STAMPS I’m looking for specific tax stamps from both the U.S. and Canada. A list of them has been posted. Tax_stamps_wanted.htmlshapeimage_2_link_0
 
NCM Home
 
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 varnished to preserve the 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