For centuries before Europeans came to the New World, tobacco had an important role in the religious and social life of the early peoples of Kentucky. W.F. Axton describes the various forms in which tobacco has been used, its quick adoption by the Old World, and its gradual development into the forms common today, especially the blended cigarette. Little has been written about the place occupied by Burley leaf in the economic life of the Commonwealth, where tobacco is still the most important crop. Tobacco in Kentucky is accompanied by charts and maps illustrating the many aspects of tobacco production.

Soul-Consoling Smoke: The First 10,000 Years
Tobacco: To Virginia and across the Appalachians, 1942-1792
The Rising Burley Giant of the West, 1792-1860
White Burley, the Queen of Plug, 1860-1890
War in the Marketplace and Patch, 1890-1911
Making the Modern Tobacco Industry, 1911-1939
Kentucky and Tobacco Today, 1939-1974