Dear Helaine and Joe: I have a Chesterfield cigarette poster with a picture of Ronald Reagan. It is 18 by 22 inches and marked "Originally printed in 1948, copyright 1980, Stampagraphic, Limited Edition." What is my piece worth?
Thank you. — A.P., Jerome, Mich.
Dear A.P.: Chesterfield as a brand of cigarettes has a very long history. Originally, it was a product of the Drummond Tobacco Co. of St. Louis, which was primarily a maker of plug tobacco.
Cigarettes were a sideline for Drummond, and other than Chesterfield, they manufactured both the Drum and Cannon brands. In the late 1890s there was a tobacco war between the American Tobacco Company, Drummond, and Leggett and Meyers. American Tobacco won and acquired Drummond in 1898 and then acquired Leggett and Meyers in 1899.
American Tobacco manufactured the Chesterfield brand until 1911, when the company was broken up as a monopoly, and Chesterfield went to Leggett and Meyers, which continued making the brand until 1998. After Leggett and Meyers stopped making Chesterfield, Philip Morris took up the brand name until 2004. This brand is reportedly still available in Europe.
In its day, Chesterfield was popular with a number of celebrities. It is said that James Dean smoked two packs a day, Alabama football coach Paul "Bear" Bryant customarily smoked them under the goal posts before football games and one Web site opined that they contributed to Humphrey Bogart's death from throat cancer at age 57.
In today's world, it is a little shocking to see the visage of a future American president with a cigarette in his mouth. The original of this image appeared in Life magazine in 1948, and in that year, the Journal of the American Medical Association stated that "... more can be said in behalf of smoking as a form of escape from tension than against it ... (and) there does not seem to be any preponderance of evidence that would indicate the abolition of the use of tobacco as a substance contrary to the public health."
So, at the time, this was a perfectly acceptable product for an actor such as Reagan to endorse, and one year later Bob Hope appeared in a similar advertisement for Chesterfield.
Today, however, things have changed, and tobacco is viewed by many as being public health enemy No. 1 — and certainly no savvy politician with any kind of national political ambitions would allow him (or herself) to be used in advertising for such a product.
Twenty plus years ago few people were eagerly looking for tobacco-related collectibles, and it was difficult to sell items such as ordinary ashtrays and generic humidors. Now, such items as cigarette lighters, figural humidors, stand ashtrays and other tobacco themed items are finding an eager audience among a range of collectors.
It is unfortunate that the poster in today's question is not an original but is a modern reprint done in 1980. It states that it is a "limited edition" — but exactly how limited was it? We suspect it was limited to the number that could be printed and sold, and this particular item currently has a value of less than $10.
Helaine Fendelman and Joe Rosson are the authors of the "Price It Yourself" (HarperResource, $19.95). Questions can by mailed to them at P.O. Box 12208, Knoxville, TN 37912-0208.