James Albert Bonsack

James Albert Bonsack (October 9, 1859,[1][2] – June 1, 1924) was an American inventor who developed an early cigarette rolling machine in 1880, and patented it the following year.

James A. Bonsack
Born(1859-10-09)October 9, 1859
Died(1924-06-01)June 1, 1924

Early life

James A. Bonsack was born in eastern Roanoke County, Virginia. His father, Jacob Bonsack owned a woolen mill, where James learned about industrial machinery. In 1878 he was admitted to Roanoke College, but decided to withdraw to work on designing a cigarette rolling machine.[3][4] After building a successful prototype and patenting his invention, he registered the Bonsack Machine Company of Virginia on March 27, 1883.[3]

Bonsack Cigarette Machine

Prior to that time, cigarettes had been rolled by hand. Readymade cigarettes were a luxury item, but were becoming increasingly popular.[5] The slow manual fabrication process—a skilled cigarette roller could produce only about four cigarettes per minute on average[6]—was insufficient to satisfy demand by the 1870s. In 1875, the Allen and Ginter company in Richmond, Virginia, offered a prize of US$75,000 (equal to $1,850,682 today) for the invention of a machine able to roll cigarettes.

Bonsack took up the challenge and left college to devote his time to building such a machine.[5] In 1880, he had a first working prototype, which was destroyed by a fire while in storage at Lynchburg, Virginia.[6] Bonsack rebuilt it and filed a patent application on September 4, 1880.[5] The patent was granted the following year (U.S. patents 238,640[2] from March 8, 1881 and 247,795[7] from October 4, 1881). Allen and Ginter had ordered a Bonsack machine but quickly rejected it, eager to save their prize money and fearing that consumers would balk at a machine-made product.[8]

Bonsack's partnership with tobacco industrialist James Buchanan Duke made full commercial use of the invention, which could produce 120,000 cigarettes in 10 hours,[6] (200 per minute), and thereby revolutionized the cigarette industry.[5][9]

  • Bonsack's cigarette rolling machine, as shown on U.S. patent 238,640
  • Bonsack Cigarette Machine, 1888
  • Bonsack machine model
  • James A. Bonsack was young when he invented his machine

Legacy

The census-designated place of Bonsack, Virginia, located in Roanoke County, was named after James Bonsack, who lived in this town located along Route 460 between Roanoke and Bedford.[10]

References
  1. Ancestry of James Albert Bonsack Archived 2007-10-20 at the Wayback Machine. URL last accessed 2006-10-11.
  2. U.S. patent 238,640, with diagrams. URL last accessed 2006-10-11.
  3. History of the Bonsack Machine Company, State Archives of North Carolina
  4. Amanda Stark-Rankins. Feed, Roll, Paste and Cut: A revolutionary invention, Living Virginia
  5. Bennett, W.: The Cigarette Century, Science 80, September/October 1980. URL last accessed 2006-10-11.
  6. Bonsack's cigarette machine Archived 2006-11-13 at the Wayback Machine. URL last accessed 2006-10-11.
  7. U.S. patent 247,795, with diagrams. URL last accessed 2006-10-11
  8. M., Brandt, Allan. The cigarette century : the rise, fall, and deadly persistence of the product that defined America. ISBN 0-465-07048-5. OCLC 1040961514.
  9. Durden, Robert F. Chapter 3. James B. Duke, The Bonsack Cigarette Machine, and the Origins of the American Tobacco Company. From The Dukes of Durham, 1865-1929. New York: Duke University Press, 1987, pp. 26-55. https://doi.org/10.1515/9780822379355-004
  10. Prince Edward County seal – wheat sheaf vs tobacco hand, The Farmville Herald, Prince Edward County, September 24, 2004

Further reading
  • Tilley, N. M.: The bright-tobacco industry, 1860 - 1929; Arno Press, 1972; ISBN 0-405-04728-2.


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