The American Tobacco Company

The American Tobacco Company - The history of the American Tobacco Company traces to the post-Civil War period in North Carolina, when a Confederate veteran, Washington Duke, began trading in tobacco. In 1874 he and his sons, Benjamin N. Duke and James Buchanan Duke, built a factory and in 1878 formed the firm of W. Duke, Sons & Co., one of the first tobacco companies to introduce cigarette-manufacturing machines.