Saints who smoked, popes who puffed, and others who snuffed: A History of Catholicism and Tobacco

(Catholic World Report) In 1873, impoverished Confederate veteran Chiswell Langhorne (left) moved his family from Lynchburg to Danville, Virginia and began looking for work. The owner of a Danville tobacco warehouse had recently developed a new system of selling tobacco by auction: Instead of having farmers’ tobacco hogsheads sampled for interested buyers, the warehouse owner had all the tobacco laid out in long rows for auction. Langhorne, a lively character with a taste for showing off, got the idea that he would make his mark somehow in the newly flourishing Danville tobacco trade. Continued