Tobacco History in Stoughton

With the decline of wheat farming in this area, a new crop appeared.  Tobacco.  This was a cash crop.  Just a few good years at favorable prices promised release from the burden of debt. 

The Scandinavians especially welcomed the crop.  Though it was new to them, they were willing to learn its secrets.  They had large families with great capacity for hard work.  In addition, they could get cheap help from the great flood of immigrants.  The Stoughton area became the center of the tobacco industry in southern Wisconsin.

Grading, or sorting, the tobacco gave employment to numerous Stoughton people, women especially.  The men worked at the shops and the women at the warehouses.  Stoughton prospered. 
Excerpts taken from Oak Opening, The Story of Stoughton, by Ferd Homme

There were many tobacco farmers around Stoughton and many of these farmers also hired Stoughtonites, especially during the planting and harvesting seasons.  

Many of our teenagers also spent parts of their summers harvesting tobacco. 

All the warehouses were built during the years 1877 and 1880.  The first tobacco bought by a local buyer was by Matthew Johnson in 1871.  For several years he was the only buyer.  In 1877 Mr. James S. Hutson erected a warehouse near the depot and soon after seven others were built, by Mr. M. Oppenheimer, Bunzel and Dormit, and Johnson and Turner.    From “Early History of Stoughton (1847-1882)” by Ada B Thompson    

The warehouses had a close proximity to the railroad tracks and depot and during the prime tobacco days there were seventeen or eighteen tobacco warehouses,  but only four remain today.  

Click the address below for more information on each remaining site. (once link available it will be blue)

515 E. Main St. - Turner, Dearborn and Atkinson

524 E. Main St. - Levi Kittleson, O.K. Roe, later L.B. Carl

567 E. Main St. - O.C. Lee Tobacco, later warehouse for Greig Machine

E. Main St. – Corner of Coffee Street - American Tobacco 

The Stoughton area became a center of the tobacco industry in southern Wisconsin, shipped to cities by rail.  

See our Depot webpage to view an image of the tobacco press artifact on display at our Depot Museum, located at 532 E. Main St., open during Chamber of Commerce hours M-F 9:00-4:30.