Professor McKeever says the cigaret-smoking boys of several schools, the records of which were investigated, were described by his informants by such epithets as sallow, sore-eyed, puny, squeaky-voiced, sickly, short-winded, and extremely nervous.
The greatest danger of the cigaret habit is its insidious nature. The boy does not realize the danger until it is too late to correct it. Hundreds of tombstones today bear silent testimony to this fact.
A chemist took the tobacco used in an average cigaret and soaked it in several teaspoonfuls of water and injected a portion of it under the skin of a cat. The cat almost immediately went into convulsions and died in fifteen minutes. Dogs have been killed with a single drop of nicotine.
Investigation shows that prominent business men positively refuse to engage men for responsible positions who smoke cigarets. The cigaret smoker, sooner or later, proves to be unreliable either physically, mentally, morally, or all three.
In Detroit alone, sixty-nine merchants have agreed not to employ cigaret-users. Chicago firms such as Montgomery Ward & Co., Marshall Field & Co., Morgan & Wright Tire Co., all prohibit cigaret smoking among employees, Thomas Edison and Henry Ford, head of the Ford Motor Company, are both opposed to the cigaret.
The manager of one of Ohio's largest mercantile houses, when asked for a job for a boy who smoked cigarets, said:
I'm sorry, but I can't use cigaret smokers. First, they smell bad, and I don't want to put them in contact with the nice young ladies who work here or the nice ladies who trade here. Second, cigarets prevent the development of strong, clear, reliable moral character. They excite the lower passions and dull the sense of right and wrong.
Judge Ben Lindsay of Denver says:
I have been in the Juvenile Court nearly ten years, dealing with thousands of boys who have disgraced themselves and their parents, and I do not know of any one habit which is more responsible for the troubles of these boys than the vile cigaret habit.
Superintendent, Mervine of the Wells Fargo Express Company, issued a letter to all agents of the company, in which he said: