Posted on: March 11, 2013<\/p>\n
By:\u00a0 Deborah Stokes<\/p>\n
On a snowy Friday afternoon in late January, a pair of well-dressed men with briefcases make their way down a back laneway in Toronto\u2019s downtown west end. Through a metal door and up a flight of stairs is the sweet-pungent smell of Canada\u2019s last handmade cigar factory. They may not know it, but they\u2019ve come to buy Cubans from the world\u2019s oldest documented cigar-making family.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy family has been making cigars since 1882,\u201d says Kris Miller, a fourth-generation cigar-maker whose family owns Frank Correnti Cigars Ltd. Miller\u2019s great-grandfather owned a cigar factory in Copenhagen in the 1880s, and headed the Danish cigar-makers union. Miller keeps his union papers on display in the factory.<\/p>\n
After the Second World War, the family immigrated to Canada and became fixtures in Toronto\u2019s once busy cigar trade. In 1979, the Millers bought the small but storied Frank Correnti Cigars factory, which had been in operation, under various owners, since 1906. Miller\u2019s father, John, semi-retired a decade ago to spend winters in the Dominican Republic, but \u201cwhen he is in the country, he comes into the shop,\u201d says Miller. On most days, the 30-year-old cigar maker is the only person in the shop, rolling Cubans and talking to customers, who find out about Correnti solely through word of mouth.<\/p>\n
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