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Tobacco topics research paper
Background on tobacco as a public health issue
History of smoking cigarettes in america
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Tobacco has been one of the most influential and controversial crops since its first discovery by the Europeans in the year 1492 when Columbus landed in the Americas. It then went on to spread among the Spanish colonists in Santo Domingo during the year 1531, shortly after Bartolome de las Casas noted that his fellow colonists began to develop a strong dependence on it.
Tobacco began spreading through Europe during the 16th century quickly becoming the vice of many, but also transforming into what people thought was a cure for many illnesses. King James I was the first to put a tax on tobacco, while King Louis XIV was the first to regulate the distribution of the crop. Overall, the efforts to limit the consumption of tobacco for medicinal purposes failed all over Europe once world leaders discovered its deathly side effects. In Turkey the consequence for smoking in public was a beheading, while in countries such as Russia and Austria, one could be fined, jailed, and tortured. King James I of England wrote about tobacco’s addictive properties and the sustained damage to the lungs that resulted from long time use.
Tobacco’s history, however, has not always been so grim. When it was first discovered on American soil, Columbus and other colonists wrote personal accounts of seeing Indians smoking ‘dried leaves through a y-shaped tube’. It was closely observed that this crop was easy to grow, trade, and use for personal enjoyment.
The tobacco economy in the early colonies was a cycle of leaf demand, slave labor demand, a global industry that eventually led to the rise of the Chesapeake Consignment system, which means American tobacco farmers would sell their sell their crops to merchants in London but still retain ownership until t...
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... an abundance to those who remained loyal customers.
It wasn’t until the 1950s that more and more evidence began to surface that tobacco was linked to lung cancer as well as other harsh diseases such as emphazema, heart disease, etc. AD’s for tobacco were removed from store windows and television commercials and were quickly replaced with anti-smoking campaigns and warnings stating that tobacco use in any form could very well lead to the development of these harsh diseases. Today tobacco is the leading killer in the United States and has remained so for a number of decades.
In conclusion, tobacco has been an extreme asset and an extreme detriment to society, and still remains so today. The boost it has given our economy to remains while the harsh pollution, health concerns, and costly production continues to be a steady issue in our nation and around the world.
Early Virginia's flourishing cultivation of tobacco drew a diversity of people, from fresh war veterans and former soldiers, to adventurers and ordinary people looking to recoup from former monetary losses. However the tobacco did not only alter the country culturally and economically, but it “ threw more wood into the fire.” It strengthened the infamous individualistic attitude the colonists had. The advent...
Morgan ably describes how the weed saved the new colony of Virginia and gave rise to servitude and eventually led to racial slavery. The first colonists who planted tobacco exported their crop to England. As this practice became more and more profitable, the crop became the only thing Virginians wanted to plant. Even after the English government tried to control and limit the planting of tobacco to raise the price, wealthy Virginians continued to export the plant. However, these Virginians could not farm tobacco alone. Labor was required.
The good thing about this is that the majority of people in the 1700’s used tobacco. Of course the Puritans also had tobacco, but it was harder to grow up north because of the rocky terrain, and the difference in temperature. The Virginians found that selling tobacco was very profitable, and growing it was relatively simple. It was a fairly easy way to make money, and expended little effort.
Producing copious amounts of tobacco required the use of indentured servants and later slaves. However, later they began growing and profiting from grain because the land for growing tobacco was not suitable anymore, and the market of tobacco wasn’t stable. Not only did they begin producing grain because of the decline of tobacco, but they also did it because they realized the slave colonies, especially the Carribean, needed grains for food because they only produced sugar. Agriculture contributed to racial division because a white farmer with little land could save up to buy a slave, and thus a poor white farmer is superior to a black. They did this so the white poor people would not gang up with the blacks to rebel. It also contributed to economy stabilized because they focus less on tobacco production and more on grain
Cultivating tobacco in the Chesapeake colonies required more labor and many plantation owners looked to the farmers in England desperate for employment. These
Tobacco cultivation: Tobacco was a poor man’s crop, it could be planted easily, it produced commercially marketable leaves within a year, and it required only simple processing.
The tobacco industry seems like a beneficial addition to our economy. It has basically been a socially acceptable business in the past because it brings jobs to our people and tax money to the government to redistribute; but consider the cost of tobacco related treatment, mortality and disability- it exceeds the benefit to the producer by two hundred billion dollars US. (4) Tobacco is a very profitable industry determined to grow despite government loss or public health. Its history has demonstrated how money can blind morals like an addiction that is never satisfied. Past lawsuits were mostly unsuccessful because the juries blamed the smoker even though the definition of criminal negligence fits the industry’s acts perfectly. Some may argue for the industry in the name of free enterprise but since they have had such a clear understanding of the dangers of their product it changes the understanding of their business tactics and motives. The success of the industry has merely been a reflection of its immoral practices. These practices have been observed through its use of the media in regards to children, the tests that used underage smokers, the use of revenue to avoid the law, the use of nicotine manipulation and the suppression of research.
Tobacco production in the Chesapeake was growing due to an enormous demand for the product in England. The demand for tobacco in England had grown during the eighteenth century over ten times what it had been originally. With so mu...
...g the 1600's, tobacco was so popular that it was even used as money. Over time it was finally realized that the use of tobacco was addictive and more hazardous to ones health than beneficial.
To summerize, the discovery of tobacco in the Americas had lasting effects on the world. Across Europe, many began smoking because of the belief that tobacco was able to cure certain ailments. Also, tobacco became a symbol of high class so we see that many middle class people began to smoke. The demand in Europe for tobacco became very high causing the production of tobacco in the Americas to increase. Colonies were set up containing large plantations with many slaves to produce tobacco. Tobacco production made the producers very rich as the cash crop was very desirable. From the use of tobacco in ceremonies for the Aztecs and Mayans to the mass production of the crop in the Americas, tobacco created much change across the world.
Early English settlers in the lower Chesapeake Bay region learned to cultivate tobacco from the Native Americans and it would prove to have profound influence in the development of Chesapeake society and the colonies of Virginia and Maryland as a whole. Between 1627 and 1669, annual tobacco exports climbed from 250,000 pounds to more than 15 million pounds. (p39. The American Journey). The Chesapeake region became the New World’s largest producer of tobacco. Since tobacco was a labour intensive crop to cultivate, the planters sought indentured servants from England as a source of cheap labour. However many servants died in alarming numbers from disease as a result from the supply of indentured servants declined, and larger planters who were wealthy managed to buy slaves. Slave population increased rapidly from 1,708 in 1660 to 189,000 in 1760. (Smith, Billy G., and Nash. Encyclopedia of American History).
Slade, John, “The Tobacco Epidemic: Lessons from History.” University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey. 1989.
Slavery was the main resource used in the Chesapeake tobacco plantations. The conditions in the Chesapeake region were difficult, which lead to malnutrition, disease, and even death. Slaves were a cheap and an abundant resource, which could be easily replaced at any time. The Chesapeake region’s tobacco industries grew and flourished on the intolerable and inhumane acts of slavery.
In North America in the 17th century, slaves were imported from Africa in order to mass produce tobacco, a popular plant throughout the world, most commonly found in the Americas. Like in Mexico, these slaves working in tobacco plantations were purchased solely due to the fact that they were cheap and easily replaceable, not requiring a monthly
Although it is beneficial for the economy for the production of tobacco products it is extremely risky to use the product. According to researchers second-hand smoke is terrible for everyone in the world who walk by someone who is exhaling. In the article by Robert Proctor “Why ban the sale of cigarettes? The case for abolition” he states that cigarettes are the “most deadl...