TARGET PLUG TOBACCO – COVINGTON, KY

(Tobacco Trade Card) TARGET PLUG. W.C. HAMILTON & Co. – Covington, KY. C. 1881. W.C. Hamilton and W.H. Senour were at 18 East Pike Street, Covington, Kentucky as advertised in THE CHURCH NEWS of THE UNION METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH. Vol. 1, New Series, No. 5.

“Promoting Covington industry as always the Covington Journal in 1864 reported 24 tobacco manufactories employing 800 men and boys and annual production at over $4 million. In 1869 Cincinnati and Covington sales exceeded $6 million. In 1879, companies included Robert Hamilton & Co.; Simrall & Crawford manufacturing fine cut; Lovell & Gedge, both plug and fine cut; Lee & Smith, plug; the Glore Brothers, Senour & Noonan, Lovell & Buffington, Hudson & Son, McNamara & Brothers, and the O’Brien Brothers using very fine white tobacco for filters making the manufactured article much finer.

Covington had firms new and old in 1886: Perkins & Ernst; Percival’s Leaf Tobacco Warehouse; W. C. Hamilton Tobacco Works; the Kenton Tobacco Factory, Lovell & Buffington and McNamara & Sealts. J. Shelley Hudson’s factory on Madison operated in two buildings, three floors each, for wrapping, storage, steaming, drying and pressing. The Robert Hamilton tobacco factory on Madison manufactured

In 1933, the Covington Chamber of Commerce set a goal, a record sale of 12 million pounds. The Covington market, “...the equal of any in the burley belt, has plentiful transportation and sufficient parking.”

Source: Kenton County Historical Society

The Church News – The Union Methodist Episcopal Church – Vol.1 New Series, No. 5