3 min read
Heritage Preservation: What Tobacco Buildings, Barns, and Landscapes Tell Future Generations
Tobacco barns are collapsing across the American South. Cigarette factories are being converted into condos. The physical heritage of the tobacco era is disappearing—and the decisions about what to preserve are being made by default.
A burley tobacco barn in Kentucky—tall, ventilated, weathered to silver-gray—is a distinctive architectural form. It's also a relic of a dying agricultural tradition. **The tobacco barns, factories, warehouses, and auction houses are the physical heritage of the cigarette era. Most will not be preserved—the economics don't work, and the stigma of the product they served discourages conservation. The decisions about what to save are being made by default—by decay, by development, by neglect.**
