ISBN-13: 9780872432383

Shortly after the Civil War, James B. Duke took over his father Washington Duke's tobacco company which grew so rapidly that by the late 1880's he virtually controlled the U.S. tobacco industry and in 1890 he founded the American Tobacco Company. Among his promotional gimmicks in 1888 was the insertion into each of his cigarette packages of miniature brochures containing a color portrait, facsimile signature and biography of one of 50 Civil War generals or admirals. He knew that there would be intense competition among his customers to buy more packages and eventually acquire a complete set and he was right. Thus began one of the earliest hobbies of popular collecting. Few complete sets survive but this book opens the entire collection for everyone to enjoy.