Tobacco is native to North and South America. It is in the same family as potatoes, peppers and poisonous nightshade. Tobacco was first raised by Native Americans. The Indians used tobacco in religious ceremonies. 

On October 15, 1492  American Indians offered Christopher Columbus dried tobacco leaves as a gift. Sailors soon brought tobacco back to Europe. A few years later, the tobacco plant was growing all over the continent of Europe.

In 1571 Nicolas Monardes, a Spanish doctor, wrote a book about the history of medicinal plants of the New World. He claimed that tobacco could cure thirty six health problems. 

Twenty years after the Caribbean War in 1856, machines that made cigarettes were used and made in Richmond, Virginia.

In 1875 R .J Reynolds Tobacco Company  (known for its Reynolds wrap aluminum foil ) was established to produce chewing tobacco.