3-028-134 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Very Fragrant Weed: Sixty Years of Cigarette Smoking: The cigarette-maker: filling, 1909. '...with the introduction of the cigarette...condemnation of tobacco began to wane, for not only did the cigarette avoid the clumsiness of the pipe and the heavy flavour of the cigar, but it also for the first time offered to English smokers the rare charm and delicacy of Turkish tobacco... Muratti and Sons opened a warehouse and factory [in Manchester] in1885... the large, handsome building in Whitworth Street...has become the centre of an enormous and world-wide trade. Consisting of six floors and a basement, its large, airy rooms provide ideal and hygienic conditions for the five hundred hands manufacturing hand-made cigarettes of the high quality which is synonymous with the name of Muratti...The finest cigarettes always have been, still are, and always will be made by hand...The quality of their goods is shown by their increasing sale in England, and by an enormous and increasing export to the Continent and British Colonies; while Messrs. Muratti hold contracts for the entire supply of Turkish cigarettes to the Tobacco Régies of France and Italy'. From "Illustrated London News", 1909.