TOBACCO AND TOBACCO PIPES

Fig. 27—The Mound-builder Tobacco Pipe.

The Mound-builders cultivated and smoked Tobacco long before civilized people knew of the plant. Above is a picture of one of their Tobacco Pipes, in which they have shown their artistic ability by carving it in the image of the Dog, their only domestic animal. Several hundred pipes like this one have been found in mounds in Ohio, representing many different animals and birds, and the human form has also been found. The American Indian not only taught the white man the use of tobacco, but it was probably from pipes very much like those of the Mound-builders, with stem and bowl, from which our modern tobacco-pipes are copied.

This Pipe is made of Ohio Pipestone, which is found in Scioto County. The Tobacco Pipes of the Mound-builders and prehistoric Indians are made not only of this material, but of several kinds of stone, including limestone, slate, steatite or soapstone, and granite.