Ybor City in Tampa, FL
Ybor city is located in the heart of Tampa, FL and is regarded as one of the earliest cigar producing cities in the United States. In the early 1880’s Tampa was nothing more than a small village of around a thousand people. Due to the creation of a good port and a new railroad line directly to Tampa, a well known Spaniard, Vicente Martinez Ybor, decided to make this his new home.
Ybor was a very well to do cigar manufacturer who was looking for a new place to establish his cigar operation. The humid weather and the newly established railroad made the small village the perfect location for both production and distribution. As Ybor established his operation in 1885, people began to flock to his 40 acres of purchased land for jobs. The success of the cigar industry in the newly developing Tampa helped establish Tampa as a growing city.
During the 20th Century Ybor City grew by leaps and bounds. People from Spain, Cuba, Italy and Isreal all immigrated to this growing city. In 1929 Ybor city hit its peak of cigar manufacturing. It rolled a total of over a half trillion cigars. This was the same year that the Great Depression hit the US and sent the cigar industry into a huge decline.
After World War 2 the cigar industry had a rebirth but Ybor was still a distant thought of the past. In the late 1980’s local artists and urban individuals were in search for a place of expression. They found one another in Ybor City where today the streets are lined with cigar bars and high fashion and the local arts.
Tags: cigar, Cigars, fine cigars, handmade cigars, history, tampa, ybor