The Library · Reference · 21+
J.C. Newman Cigar Co.: America's oldest family-owned cigar maker
Ybor City, the historic cigar district on Tampa's east side, had more than 200 cigar factories at its peak in the 1920s. One is still rolling cigars today. It's been owned by the same family for four generations, and it started in a barn.
A barn in Cleveland
Julius Caesar Newman, a Hungarian immigrant, rolled his first cigars in his family’s barn in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1895. There was no grand plan behind it — it was a trade he could practice with what he had. It just happened to be a trade his family never stopped practicing.
Why Tampa
In 1954 the company relocated to Tampa, into a cigar factory built in 1910 in Ybor City — by then already the center of American premium cigar manufacturing, close to the Cuban tobacco supply lines that made Tampa the obvious place to be. The building they moved into was one of the last and largest ever built during Ybor City’s factory boom.
El Reloj
That factory has a name: El Reloj, Spanish for “the clock.” A six-story clock tower tops the building, and before most workers owned a personal watch, that tower’s bells told the whole neighborhood when to start a shift, when to break, and when to go home.
Last one standing
Ybor City had over 200 cigar factories at its 1920s peak. El Reloj is the only one still operating as a working cigar factory today.
Four generations
J.C. Newman has stayed a Newman company for 130 years. It’s now run by the fourth generation — Eric Newman and Robert Newman — which makes it, by the company’s own account and the historical record behind it, the oldest family-owned premium cigar maker in the United States.
Part of what they’ve kept running is stranger than the family history: a set of antique cigar-rolling machines from the 1930s — ARENCO and American Machine and Foundry models — still in daily use on the factory floor, hand-fed by operators the same way they were nearly a century ago.
What they actually make
The catalog spans several countries of tobacco origin under one family roof:
- Dominican: Diamond Crown, Cuesta-Rey, La Unica
- Nicaraguan: Brick House, Quorum, Alcazar
- U.S.-made, in Tampa: Rigoletto and The American, rolled on the vintage machines described above — genuinely rare in a category almost entirely outsourced abroad
Why it's on our list
Ember Nights are built around cigar lounges, and Tampa Bay is one of our six Florida markets — a rum town with a beach attached, and now the home of the last working cigar factory on a street that used to have two hundred of them. That’s worth knowing whether you’re in Tampa or not.
See the Tampa Bay market for the tiki rooms we’ve scouted there.
Questions people actually ask
- Where is J.C. Newman Cigar Co. located?
- In the El Reloj factory at 2701 N. 16th Street in Ybor City, Tampa's historic cigar district — inside the Ybor City National Historic Landmark District.
- Is J.C. Newman really the oldest family-owned cigar maker in America?
- That's the company's own claim, and the underlying facts support it: founded in 1895 by Julius Caesar Newman and still run by his descendants — Eric Newman and Robert Newman today — the fourth generation of Newman ownership.
- What does El Reloj mean?
- Spanish for "the clock." The name comes from the factory's six-story clock tower, built in 1910, which once told Ybor City's cigar workers when to start their shift, break, and go home — long before most people owned a watch.
- What cigars does J.C. Newman make?
- Dominican lines including Diamond Crown and Cuesta-Rey, Nicaraguan lines including Brick House and Quorum, and U.S.-made cigars — including The American — hand-rolled in Tampa on the company's antique 1930s machines.
- Can you visit the J.C. Newman factory?
- The company offers public factory tours of El Reloj in Ybor City; check jcnewman.com for current tour times before visiting.
No affiliation, no sponsorship, no paid placement — J.C. Newman didn’t ask for this and doesn’t know it exists. We’re just fans of a genuinely interesting Florida story. Tobacco use carries real health risks; Ember Nights are strictly 21+ and no cigar is ever required.
Who wrote this, and why
Rum & Thatch is a free tiki social club in Northeast Florida — monthly Mixers at real tiki bars, Driftwood Socials on the sand, and Ember Nights at cigar lounges across Jacksonville, Ponte Vedra Beach, and St. Augustine. We keep this library because the scene deserves a straight answer in one place. Free to join, no invite, strictly 21+.