TOBACCO HABIT

Hawera Star, Volume XLIX, 14 February 1930, Page 3

TOBACCO HABIT

THE FIRST SMOKER, The first person to smoke tobacco in Europe is to be honoured by u eomi memorative tablet erected in' his. home town of Ayamonte, in -Spain, by the Spanish Tobacco Monopoly. The entire tobacco industry of Europe will -be invited by the Ayamonte city fathers to participate in the dedication, some time this year. Writes Dr. El. E. Free in his “Week’s Science’’ (New York) : “Historical research has shown, the , Ayamontanians assert, that one RodI rigo de Jerez, a. citizen of that munif cipality, was among the companions of Columbus on his voyage of discovery. While in America de Je.rez learned from the Indians, the story continues, the habit of smoking tobacco. Returning from his New World adventure, the travelled Ayamontanian brought with I him a bale of Indian leaves, 'properly (dried and cured for smoking. First of all residents of Europe, it is asserted, he was to be seen with smoke coming from his mouth and nose. Astonished witnesses added eyes and ears for good measure, and reported to the Spanish Inquisition that a man at Ayamonte was possessed of a smoking devil. No less an authority than Padre Tomaso de Torquemada, famous Inquisition chief, investigated, but evidently accepted de Jergzz’s smoke-emit-ting feats as natural instead of diabolic, for Europe’s fir'st person to endorse a brand of tobacco does not seem to have been quartered or’burnt. It is to Rodrigo de Jerez of Ayamonte, his present townsmen assert, that the whole tobacco industry of Europe must be traced.”'