In the factories, readers – hired by the workers for entertainment – read from patriotic newspapers and spread information about the political situation.Ĭuban revolutionary José Martí with Ybor City cigar workers in 1893 José Martí, a Cuban revolutionary leader, visited Ybor City before the 1895 Cuban War for Independence to gather support. Because of its proximity to Cuba and large Cuban immigrant population, the town naturally became a center for Cuban exiles and political activity. The largest Hispanic clubs in Tampa between 18 were the Centro Asturiano, Circulo Cubano, El Centro Español, and La Union Marti-Maceo. Ybor City’s residents formed ethnic social clubs and benevolent organizations, which offered their members cooperative medical plans and charitable services. While most of the Hispanic residents worked in the cigar factories, these immigrants also produced the beautiful boxes that held their cigars, operated small shops, and supported the service industries. Ybor City’s concentration of diverse ethnic groups was uncommon in the American South and added to the unique character of the town. Though many of the residents were Hispanic, immigrating from Spain or Spanish Cuba, there were also Italian, German, Rumanian Jewish, and Chinese immigrants in Ybor City. By 1890, Ybor City’s population had doubled from the first year and was around 6,000. Of the first wave of Cuban immigrants, 15% were Afro-Cuban. In 1886, Martínez-Ybor and his manufacturing colleagues oversaw the construction of the first 176 worker houses in Ybor City, which became home to some of the 3,000 people already handcrafting cigars in their new factories. Tampa eventually annexed Ybor City in 1887, but the Hispanic factory town kept a separate identity. When Martínez-Ybor and Haya purchased undeveloped land to build their planned community, Tampa’s population was around 700. Tampa was an ideal location for Martínez-Ybor’s factories because of its warm, humid climate and its close proximity to Cuba, which was Martínez-Ybor’s preferred source of labor and tobacco. In 1885, Martínez-Ybor and Ignacio Haya, a friend and manufacturing peer, formed a partnership to develop a cigar-manufacturing town near Tampa, Florida.Ĭuban American Vicente Martinez-Ybor founded Ybor City in 1886 (ca. Though his cigar factories were in the U.S., Ybor imported his tobacco from Cuba and hired fellow Cuban exiles to work in his factories. He moved his factories to the United States in the late 1860s, first to Key West and New York City. While in Cuba, he founded the “Prince of Wales” brand of cigars and achieved some success there, but Ybor supported Cuban independence and was therefore unable to stay in Spanish Cuba. One of these manufacturing titans was Vicente Martínez-Ybor, who was born in Valencia, Spain, and lived in Spanish Cuba for 15 years before immigrating to the United States. It was new American tariffs on imported cigars and political trouble in Cuba that compelled Cuban cigar manufacturers to build factories in the United States in the latter part of the 19th century. Ybor City’s vibrant character, preserved best in the 7th Avenue Commercial Strip, is defined by the community’s blend of cultures from European, Asian, and Cuban immigrants who settled there to support the region’s once-booming cigar industry brought to Tampa in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The district contains more than 950 historic buildings and structures built during its peak industrial years. At the turn of the 20th century, nowhere in the United States was as famous for its cigars as Tampa’s Ybor City, which was once known as the “Cigar Capital of the World.” The Ybor City Historic District is a National Historic Landmark located northeast of Tampa’s downtown.
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