Ann Arbor Tobacco Sales

Salesmen for "My Lady Nicotine" have been invading Ann Arbor for the last two weeks and displaying their tempting goods to the retailers here in great quantities. The question has often arisen as to how much tobacco is consumed in a college town like Ann Arbor during the school year, but no satisfactory means of settling the question have presented themselves. An interview with the various salesmen who annually and semi-annually visit the city will serve to show in some degree the amount consumed. The agent for the popular smoking tobacco most used by the students was asked how much he sold here during the year. "Well," said he, "you won't believe me if I tell you. I do not know of any place of this size in the United States where the amount of tobacco used equals that here in Ann Arbor. It is a positive fact that we sell altogether about twenty tons of this common weed used for cigarettes and pipes during the course of a year."

This is an astonishing fact and exceedingly interesting when it is taken into consideration that this is only for one brand. A dealer in cigars was in town today and said that he sold over a thousand boxes of his brand alone here last year. A talk with some of the local dealers revealed the fact that the pipe has become much more popular than the cigarette within the last couple of years, but no one would gather this form private observation. The Argus will endeavor to make a comparison of the amount of tobacco used here this year and in former years at an early date with some more interesting facts about this college custom, which has been severely criticized of late in the big Russian universities. Contrary to the fact that smoking had been abolished in some of these schools in Russia, Duke Boris, when in Chicago, was interviewed on the subject and he expressed himself as believing that the Russian students did as they pleased in this regard.