Tobacco Documents Online

Ar:ikel aus ...... YORK H~RAI,D TRIBbSIZ" vom ~.Januar 1954 Recent r~ports on experiments with mice have given wide publicity to a theory that cigarette smoking is in some way linked with lung cancer in human beings. Although conducted by doctors of professional standing, these experiments are not re~rded as conclusive in the field of cancer research. However, we do not believe th~-~ any serious medical research, even though its results are inconclusive should be disregarded or lightly dismissed. At the same time, we feel it is in the public interest to cell attention to the fact that eminent doctors and research scientists have publicly questioned the claimed significa-uce 3f these experiments. Distinguished authorities point out: i, That m~dical research of recent years indicates many possible causes of lung center. 2. That there is no ..zreement among the authorities regarding ~vhat the cause is. • ~. That there is no proof that cigarette smoking is one of the causes. 4. That statistics purporting to link cig-~rette smoking with the disease could ap~!y with equal force to any one of m~ny other aspects of modern life. Indeed the validity of the statistics themselves is questioned by num~ rous scientists. ~,Ye accept an interest in people's health as a basic responsibility, paramount to every other consideration in our business. We believe the products =e make are not injurious to health. ';'(e always have and always will cooperate closely with those whose task it is to safeguard the public health. For more than 300 years tobacco has given solace, relaxation, and enjoyment to mankind. At one time or another during those years critics have held it responsible for practically every disease of the human body. One by one these charges have been abandoned for lack of evidence. Regardless of the r~co.~'d of the past, the fact that cigarette.smoking today should even be suspected as a cuuse of a serious disease is a matter of deep concern to us, many ~eople h£ve asked us -hat we are doing to meet the public's concern aroused by the recent r~.ports. }}ere is the answer: i. ;79 are pledging aid and assistance to the research effort into all phases of tobacco use and health. This joint fin-uncial aid '~il! of course be in addition to '~hzt is already beinE contributed b:f individual companies. 2. For this -.urpose ":e ere establishing a ~oint industry group consisting initially of the undersigned. This group hill be known as TO,BACCO L'!DUSTRY :ES~ARCH CO~'.!I'.rT~Z. o

- 2- ~B In charge of the research activities of the Con~ittee will be a scientist of unimpeachable integrity and national repute. In addition there will be an Advisezy Board of scientists disinter- ested in the cigarette industry. A group of distinguished men from medicine, science, and education ~ill be invited to serve on this Board. These sci6~tists will advise the Committee on its research activities. This statement is being issued because we believe the people are entitled to know where we stand on this matter and "~hat we intend to do about it. 5400 '~m?.ire Sta%e Building, New York i, N.Y. 0

l ! i | ANSLAT~[ ON, Article from "PARIS-IiATCH" No. 248: 26th Dec. - 2rid Jan., 1954 | KAYMOND CARTIER TELLS OF THE DECEMBER BATTLE BETWEEN ~-~RICAN DOCTORS.. AND THE TOBACCO-MAGNATESt i |, ,i i "The cigarette multiplies by twenty the risks of cancer of the lungs." The fall became ~ronounced on Wednesday, 8%h December, as soon as Wal! Street opened. R.J. Reynoldst starting at 41 dollars I/~, fell to 3U. Ligget and Myers, whose shares were worth 82 dollars a few weeks before, ~re at 64. American Tobacco~ ~hich reached as high as dollars in 19~3, dropped again from 67 to 61 7/8. These names are not very familiar to the public, but they do really "ring a bell", when one adds s Reynolds = "Camel"; LiEge% = "Chesterfield"| American Tobacco ="Lucky Strike". - clouds of smoke supporting millions of dollars. The storm which shook Wall Street originated not far from Wall Street. The dentists of "Grand New York" were holding their XXVIIIth annual Congress, and they were listening to some of the experts on cancer speaking of their recent discoveries. One of them, Professor Alton Ochsnar, came from New Orleans and the well-known Tulane University where he is head of the surgical department. Another, Dr. Ernest Wynder, represented the anti-cancer Centre of Manhattan~ and a thirdt Dr. Grace Roth, had arrived from the Mayo Foundation, which, situated in distant Minnesota, is one of the most stupendous medical establishments in the world. With one accord, they indicted - tobacco ' And, as these learned men made their objective statements, fortunes built up on the most colossal publicity of all time, shrank visibly. EV@~V cigarette costs half-an-hour of one's life: This is not the first time that tobacco has been denounced. As a matter of fact, it has been conde~med ceaselessly since it was bequeathed to the white man - perhaps as retribution- by the red man who was threatened with extermination, ln Russia, where there has never been any hesA~ation about adopting decisive measures~ an imperial rescript ordained that the noses of smokers should be cut off. Elsewhere~ the proprieties, religions and medical

2 Artlcle from "PARIS-MATC~"~ No. 248 : 26th Dec. - 2nd gan., 1954 : sTstems have frequently united against tobacco. In America itself~ tobacco had and still has determined enemies. Edison claimed that the cigarette was a deadly objectt and Nenl'F Ford dismissed at once from his factories any person caught emitting a puff of smoke. The law of the Mormons forbids them to "defile the air of God"~ and some Protestant churches invoke the tradition of their great Puritan ancestors in support of the idea t~t totacco is "an invention of the Devil". One of the powerful elements in Amerlca~ the "Reader's Digest" (8 million printed),is systematically hostile to it and does not spare any effort in connection wlth demonstrating its hax~nful effect. "The 400 thousand million cigarettes that we smoke" ~Tote the "Digest" in 19~0, " contain 23 million gallons of nicotine~ i.e. enough to kill the entire population of the United States a thousand times over." Nothing can be more encouraging, except perhaps the following statistics : out Of 100 heavy smoksPs~ only 46 reach the age of sixty, whilst the percentage is 61 for light smokers and 66 for non-smoEers. According to a calculation also given by the "Digest"t the fact emerges from this that any person consuming one packet of cigarettes per day shortens his llfe by thlrty-four and slx-tenths minutes per cigarette9 i.e. eleven and three quarter%)hours for the ~ntire packet. b The present offensive is~ however, more dangerous than the previous ones~ because it is narTowsd dc~n to one central point. Tobacco has not been cleared of any of the Amputations made against it previously- stomach troubles~ speeding up of the heart, slowing down of the superficial (surface} circulation~ chronic cough~ etc., etc.- but~ over and above these, a precise and tewrible charge is brought against it: it is accused of being responsible for the ~ramatic increase in the nunber of lung-cancers. Whereas most of the other cancers are on the decrease~ lung-cancer is increasing, it is thriving and multiplying. For s long t/rasp it has been an almost theoretical disease (partl7 be~aus~ it was not divulged)~ but it~ow quickly become s nightmare. From 1933 until 1953~ in twenty short years~' the number of cases has increased fourfoldt and in the year Just ending~ lung-cance~ is supposed to have killed nearl7 twenty thousand men and more than three thousand women in the United States. The much ETeater proportion of male victims corresponds to a more long-standing use of tobacco; this and the fact that an overwhelming proportion ," °f

O TRANSLATXON: Articles from "PARIS-~ATCH'' No. 248 : 26th Dec.~ - 2nd Jan., 1954 : -- H, of these victims are excessive smokers and are nearly always cigarette-smdkers; and the prodigious rise in cigarette- consumptiony the sale of the latter having increased fourfold at the same time as luDg-eancer - all this constitut- ed already a very weighty mass of presumptive evidence. After they have added to thiswhat they consider to be the conclusions drawn from experience~ several doctors do not hesitate furthert they condemn as guilty tobacco in general and the cigarette in particular. l~icotine is exonerated: the deadly-cualltY resides ~n She People already began to suspect the correlation between the number of lung-cancers and the increase in the consumption of cigarettes about twenty years ago. Their first idea was to aecusa(blame~ nicotine, the evil genius of tobaoeo~ a poison so violent in its pure state that a few drops on the skin can cause death. But nicotine~ w,hich ~s accused on many countsy was acquitted on the cancer indictment. The investigation was then narrowed down to a consideration of the many complex products given off by the combustion of the tobacco and indicated by the general term: tars. Like nicotine~ they invade the mouthy the larynx and the lungs. They are comparatively harmless with regard to these lastI if the smoker does not swallow the smokey which is the general case wlth pipe-users and cigar-smokers. On the eontrary~ the majority of cigarette- smokers "fill their lungs"~ as one would say in English. they fill themselves with tobacco and allow the alluvial products from the smoke to be deposited on their pulmonary tissues, Now~ it is a fact that it is amongst cigarette- smokers that lung-cancer is spreading particular havoc. Out of ly000 cases noted by Dr. Wyudery only 15~ i.e.l.5 % concerned non-smokersy whilst pips- and cigar-lovers formed only 6 ~ of the total. The other 925 persons suffer - ing fro,. lung-cancer smoked cigarettesy generally at the rate of twenty or more per day. Work proceeded cautiously and progressed slowly. In the present instance, scientific research is complicated by the civil war which has been raging for four centuries between the friends and the foes of tobacco9 not to menticm the vast economic interests at stake. In 1950t for example~

4 Articles from "PARIS-MATCH", NO. ~48: 26t5 Dec. - ~d San.. 19~ : "Collieres" magazine, the antithesis of the "Reader's Digest" with regard $o the question of smokingt triumphantly brought up the point about the immunity of a collection of unfortunate mice, subjected to something that constitutes the delight of hundreds Of millions of human beings. But~ in association with the eancerologist, Ernest L. b~nder and with the assistance of an ingenious smoking machine, the surgeong Bvart8 E. Graham, of Saint Louis, spread cancers of the skin at will amongst other mice by means of tobacco-tars. Then it was that he uttered the historic words that are to-day shaking the structure of one of the triumphantC~.s,~~I) industries of America: " Me have established shadow of doubt that there is something in cigarettes that can give(cause) cancer." Since then, the accusation has been extended. At the "~rand ~ew York" Congress of dentists, it attained the proportions of an indictment. Graham was not present, but his !ieutenant~ W~der, a yo~n~ scholar with the face of an athletet spoke of their communal work, also of twelve analogous experiments carried out in the United States and abroad. "Heavy and prolonged consum~tlon of cigarettes," he concluded~"multi~i~v twenty the risks of lung-cancer." Alton Ochsner, the .celebrated surgeon~ who has performed some Of the most daring lung-operations, gave him the support of his authority in the conflict. "At the start of my careerI e quarter of a century ago," he sai~ "I only saw one single cancer of the lungs in four years. In the last fifteen years~ I have seen thousands. In 1970t one American in twelve or fifteen will have one. I am convinced that this unheard of increase is due to the rise in cigarette- consumption and to the cancerous factor to be found in the, smoke from them". Ochsner, an old(i.e, inveterate) tobacco- hater~ who refuses to admit to his well-kno~ New Orleans clinic, those who will not give up smokingj adds this ~rXtty remark: "The advantage of the very heavy smokers is that they contract a heart-disease which does not leave ~hem time to develop a fine specimen of lung-cancer." There is no peace of mind~ scientific or otherwiset in face of tobacco. (i,e, in face of tobacco menace). ~: "~: In ~his photo, are all the American brands of • cigarettes,divided into four large categories, from left to rightj classified according to extent of their sales, the standard models~ the King Size (long), the filter ti~s , .f

~° ." •~.. TRA~SI, A,~O~, Articles from "PARIS-I~TCP~,t No. 248 26th Dec.~ - 2nd gan.~ 1954 t (Parliament, ,~.M: and Du Maurier) and finally the de-nicotin- ise~ elga~ttes (Sane) and the mentholated cigarettes (Keel). All the brands of ciearettes want %o be reassuring. The Star9 ~.~a(Heading on page 15). page 17). We shall have to wait for some weeks before we can assess the repercussions of the offensive launched by the doctors against the cigarette-industry, But ~hat they are attsckingt In the name of the transcendent principle of public health~ is one of the oldest and most famous "Americanisms". America was born in tobacco. The colonists in Virglnla~ twelve years before the all too famous pilgrims from Plymouth~ found it when they arrived in the Indian fields~ and it is one of them~ John Rolfes consort of an Indian prinoess~ who learned how to take out of it a bitterness of flavour which would have been disagreeable to E',~opean throats. Tobacco then bee--me the pillar of the whole colonial period, the wealth which attracted men and money to America. The fact that George Washington~ the father of the Republie~ was him- self a planter is a symbol of real value. Then~ in the 19%h century~ the stupendous capitalist venture seized hold of tobacco~as it had seized hold of petroleumt steel and corned beef. Its Rockefeller~ its Carnegie was James Buchanan Duke~ a man smooth and sententious llke a country lawyer~ whose name has been perpetuated for years in the matrimonial adventures of his daughter~ and whose name ~ perpetuated to-day t.banks to something which is far more worthy of hlm~ namely a maEnificent University fo~ndatlon. The cigarettes attacked by th_ doctors of America~ is Duke~ the sun of a "poor white man" from the South~ who made it one of the objects most largely consmned and one of the most tyrannical needs of ec, ntemporary man. When James B. Duke entered the tobacco-lndustry in 1885~ it was out of the question that any woman other than a wanton should smoke. But the cigarette, which was, like other thlnffs~ zorbidden to the then ~eaker sex~ was considered as effeminate for the strong sex of the time.

6 TRANSLATION: Artic!e~ from "PARIS-M~TCH", No. 248, 26th Dec. - 2nd Jan., 1954 : m| i , , ,, , , ,, .° According to the order of social hierarchies, men chewed tobacco~ smoked a plps or smoked a cigar~ and it must have been a stroke of sheer Ins~iretion that made Duke enter the weakest snd most decried section of the tobacco-industry. In 1900~ his American Tobacco Company, a growing and spreading powera was extendlnE its tentacles and was manu- facturing 92.7 ~ of all the cigarettes produced in the United States. And that was Just ths time when the little paper cylinders, ridiculed by the fine bearded gentlemen at the end of the century~ began to be seen between the lips of a new, clean shaven generation. Since that time, their consumption in the United States has been multiplied by the eo-efflcient Ii.77~. For I0 cigaPettes smoked in 1900~ Americans smoke I17~000 to-day | The h~story of the great trusts tells of a stupend- ous venture9 and present-day Americas now partly sociallssd and with her vitality terribly weakened, may miss the brutality and rich fruitfuln~.ss of that epoch. The abuses were great, but tremendous things were achieved. ~ and never~ in the entire history of the world, was there a time when, viewed as a whole, the living conditions of the greatest number improved more quickly. Duke and his American Tobacco 9 falsified the tobacco-prices so shamelessly that the Ken-tucky planters rose up in revolt and bu2ned down the Company's warehouses by force of arms. Looking at it from another angle, the development in tobacco-cultivation created enormous revenues, snd~ in ~hat had once been sleepy little towns of the South, a great industry was coming perceptibly to life. Abovu all~ it made Durham important~ wh_re to-day n.Prly one third of all the American cigarettes are rolled. Hmmver~ a rival~ Winston Salem, stood facing Durham and still stands thusI Just as a person c,lled Richard Joshua Reynolds, a revolutionary tywe, still held out acainet Duke. For s short time. he ~as s:.'allowed up - "Duke has e~ten me up" he ssid, "but digesting me is quite ~n~ther matter" - then he quickly broke loose and founded "Camel", now the greatest brand of cigsrettes in the world. But by that tlme~ the American Tobacco had already passed its zenith. • Duke, having conquered the American market9 had invaded England. Merely by making an appearance, he federat- ~;~_%~ c=~.~ e~e_d t~irteen manufacturers who were at one another's thr6ats , ~ JUSt~ before, and he brought about the formation1 of the G

7 Article from "PARIS-~ATCH"~ No. 248, 26th Dec. 2rid Jan., 19~4 s i i ii (collision) Imperial Tobacco Corporation, with a capital of I~ million ponds sterling, i.e. 375 million gold francs. The ~t of the two giants, the Imperial and the American. was terrifyingI except for the sub,eats of Edward VII~ who smoked -almost free of charge~ for several years. An agreement prevented them from destroying one another and J.B. Duke. elected chairman of the British American Tobacco~ found him- self at the head of the organisation most closely approachlng a world trust. In America alone, three hundred firms had been absorbed~ and a vast retail chain, the 2~500 United Cigars stores with a red front, had been o rganieed. Controll ing as he did B2 % of the cigare~tes~ 71% of the pips- tobacco and 92 % of ~he snuff~ Duke paid to his shareholders 19 ~ of dividends per annum from 1903 to 1908. It was %hen that he became the fabulous "chAtelain" of Somerville~ New Jersey, and also the splendid patron of the University of Durham~ which took his name in exchange for a 50 million dollar endowment. He h~mself dismembered his Enrnirej The blow which dislocated the American Tobacco was dealt by the first Roosevelt, Republican president and enemy of capitalist monopolies. From his bed of sickness~ Duke pleaded for three days against the anti-trust law~ a lost cause. The Circuit Court of Appeals of New Yo~k ordered the dissolution of the American Tobaccoj and the Supreme Court of the United States confirmed this decision. But Duke himself was given the task of sharing out his own empire. He freed once and for all the individualist, Reynolds (Camel), emancipated United Cigar Stores Corporation and divided up his 1~0 factories amongst three separate co~maniass a reduced American Tobacco (Lucky Strike) which he retained, a firm of Liggett and Myers (Chesterfield) ~d a firm of P. Lorillard (Old Gold). Then~ a little weary ~tobacco~ he turned his irrepressible energy towards hydro-electric power. When he died~ in 1925, in his New York apartment on 78th St~et~ he had harnessed several rivers in the South of the United States~ and he had created the aluminium industry in the province of Quebec. He also left,behind him~far too much money - S00 million dollars, according to certain estimates~ 113 millions according to others - to a daughter eal!ed Doris5 aged twelve~ who had really not done very much to d~serve such • fortune and who subsequently did less still to Justify its being ~f ven to her. It is not in the generation of the creators ounders) that large-scale capitalism is usually immoral. O

8 ~s Article i~m "PAItlS-~L~TCH", No. 248~ 26th Dec. 2nd Jan., 1954 : . i| ii i The American smokes 8.760 ciearettes vesrlvs T~ American ~i~arette-industry was founded. Its fabulous development still remained %o be experienced. Larp-scale diffusion abroad eclipsed~ behind Camel and Lucky Strike, the old and well-known Egyptian and British brands~ but that is a mere bagatelle co~ared with domestic consumer,an in its swift and giddy upward clinb. In 1932t barely I00 thousand million Qigarettes were smoked~ whereas, in 1952, 400 thousand million were smoked. Three quarters of American men ~ two fifths of American women~ 104 million people in all are regular smokers, and the individual and collective tribute that they pay to their pleasu~e~ or to their vice~ is colossal. Taken col!ectivelyj it represented 4~342~000,000 dollars last ~art i.e. three times the entire cinema tam, Lugs, and twice the salary of all the school- masters in the United States. Taken Indivldually~ it was equivalent to ~ annual expenditure of 97 dollars 50, or approximately 3~,000 francs per smoker, at the rate of an average consumption of 24 ~igarettes per day~ or 8~760 cigarettes per annum. Only meat and milk represent a larger share (part) than clgnrettes in the budgets of Americans, and even then by a very narrow margin. No other country in the world approaches, or can approach, America as regards their extravagance in the sphere of tobacco. Another outstanding side (aspect) of the cigarette- industry ~as the regular (i.e. systematic) development of its marke~. The increase in sales, whose average was never Iowez than 3 %, came to 4.1% in 15~I and 5.3 % in 1952. This progress was brought about by a whole host of factors, ~arefully so, ted out in the brilliant headquarters of Dur~i Winston Salem and Richmond! the increase in popu- • lation~ the added ~alth of the most numerous classes, the growth in the average consumption per smoker~ the progress- ive winning-over of women to smoking, the lowering of the age, f~om which smoking becomes a Tegular habit, etc. Fields for prospectin~ were still left wide open in the ranks of women and adolescents, as the majority of women and 85 % of the fourteen year olds are not yet habitual smokers. in the markets (i.e. Stock Exchange) of the United States, it was considered that the shares of cigarette-companles were shares that could never fall~ because of the idea that no economic fluctuation could exert any influence upon the national taste for smoking. Prosecuted in 1940, condemned G