| For some cigar and tobacco shops, a Cigar
| |
| | professional carvers. Using axes,
|
| Store Indian sits outside the door. While
| |
| | chisels, and mallets on white pine, the
|
| this can easily be viewed as an unwanted
| |
| | wooden figures were carved and then
|
| stereotype on the Native American
| |
| | painted in a tapestry of folklore, fine
|
| community, it is also a part of cigar and
| |
| | arts, and popular culture. In addition to
|
| tobacco history. As some of these wooden
| |
| | wooden Indians, carvers also produced
|
| Indians appear inviting, happily greeting
| |
| | wooden sports figures, politicians, high
|
| any incoming customers, others appear
| |
| | society women, and Scotsmen.
|
| defensive, as if guarding the store from
| |
| |
|
| shop lifters, thieves, and No Smoking
| |
| | What They Looked Like
|
| ordinances. However they appear, they
| |
| | The first wooden Indians were both male
|
| appear often: Cigar Store Indians have
| |
| | and female, allowing the seller to choose
|
| become advertising icons in the world of
| |
| | which gender they wanted to help market
|
| tobacco.
| |
| | their goods. When the wooden Indian craze
|
|
| |
| | first began, the female wooden Indian was
|
| Just like candy-caned barber poles have
| |
| | used four times more often than the male
|
| become synonymous with barber shops, and
| |
| | wooden Indian. While female wooden
|
| talking lizards have become synonymous
| |
| | Indians were occasionally carved with a
|
| with car insurance, these wooden Indians
| |
| | papoose, and donned with a headdress of
|
| have become synonymous with cigar stores,
| |
| | tobacco leaves instead of feathers, male
|
| historically serving as an advertisement
| |
| | figures were often dressed in the
|
| that tells the masses where tobacco is
| |
| | traditional warbonnets (a ceremonial
|
| sold. Nowadays, however, the Cigar Store
| |
| | headdress) of the Plains Indians.
|
| Indian is used less as a form of
| |
| |
|
| advertisement and more as a form of
| |
| | Present Day
|
| decoration, one that brings dimension and
| |
| | The height of the wooden Indian fad took
|
| culture to tobacco's colorful past.
| |
| | place in the 1800's, with a carved statue
|
|
| |
| | standing outside nearly every tobacco
|
| How They Began
| |
| | shop in America. However, in a sad
|
| When Native Americans introduced tobacco
| |
| | parallel to Native American history, the
|
| to the European populace, they adopted
| |
| | wooden Indian was often mistreated,
|
| the role as spokespeople for the cigar
| |
| | damaged by passer-bys. Because of this,
|
| industry, forever making their culture
| |
| | the beginning of the 1900's marked an end
|
| intertwined with the culture of tobacco.
| |
| | to this popular form of tobacco
|
| Because of this, a visual picture of an
| |
| | advertising.
|
| Indian was often used to tell the masses,
| |
| |
|
| highly illiterate masses, where they
| |
| | In today's day and age, with a greater
|
| could purchase tobacco.
| |
| | amount of people literate, the need for a
|
|
| |
| | visual advertisement waned, sidewalk
|
| The 17th Century Europe marked the first
| |
| | obstruction laws, and high manufacturing
|
| time sellers of tobacco used a wooden
| |
| | costs, the Cigar Store Indian is not as
|
| Indian to peddle their product. However,
| |
| | common as it once was. Some still do
|
| because those who did the first carving
| |
| | stand outside cigar shop doorways, but
|
| had not actually seen a Native American,
| |
| | many others stand inside museums,
|
| the first wooden Indians that sat on
| |
| | representing a part of tobacco history.
|
| stoops of the cigar stores of Europe
| |
| | Another reason for their disappearance is
|
| often appeared to be fanciful, fictional
| |
| | the sensitivity of the subject. While
|
| characters. Yet, by the time the wooden
| |
| | some people view a Cigar Store Indian as
|
| Indian made its way to America, it began
| |
| | a stereotype, others view it as part of
|
| to take on a much more genuine, authentic
| |
| | cigar lore and a laudation for a group of
|
| appearance.
| |
| | people who introduced the blissfulness of
|
|
| |
| | tobacco to an unknowing culture.Jennifer
|
| How They Were Carved
| |
| | Jordan is an editor and staff writer for
|
| While some Cigar Store Indians were made
| |
| | At home in a design firm in Denver,
|
| of cast iron, most were made of wood. The
| |
| | Colorado, she writes articles specific to
|
| majority of them were made by artisans or
| |
| | the finer things in life.
|
