This familiar commercial building has stood at Second and Court streets since its construction in 1902 on the site of an old hospital. From about 1919 to the 1950s, the General Cigar Company manufactured hand-rolled cigars, producing a million cigars weekly just before the onset of the Great Depression. At that time, about a thousand people were employed there, mostly women and children. General Cigar was one of Evansville’s four largest cigar manufacturers, which included the Fendrich Cigar Company. Over the years, the building has been well preserved, showing few physical alterations; it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2000.
