Tag Archives: chewing tobacco

Chew in baseball, Chewing tobacco, Curt Schilling, San Francisco, Tony Gwynn

Madison Bumgarner, Bruce Bochy both support ban on chewing tobacco at AT&T Park

May 13, 2015 Pepe Lepew

Surprised me a bit that these two would step into this issue, but I thought it was great. The city of San Francisco banned chewing tobacco recently at all sporting venues (It won’t actually take effect until Jan. 1, 2016), including at the Giants’ stadium, AT&T Park. This means that not only fans can’t chew in the park, but players can’t either.

World Series MVP Madison Bumgarner and manager Bruce Bochy expressed their support for the move last week.

From a Los Angeles Times article:

Giants Manager Bruce Bochy applauded the decision: “It’s a step in the right direction,” he told the team’s website. “I think it can be a good thing. It’s going to be hard to enforce. It’s a tough habit to break.”

Giants ace Madison Bumgarner also supported the law. “Hopefully it will be a positive thing for us players. It’s not an easy thing to stop doing, but I support the city.”

There is also a bill winding its way through the California Assembly to ban chewing tobacco at all ballparks in the state, which would include AT&T, Dodger Stadium, Petco in San Diego, the Oakland Coliseum and the L.A. Angels’ stadium.

Major League Baseball is under increasing pressure to ban chewing tobacco in all ballparks, especially since the death of Tony Gwynn from salivary gland cancer (Tony blamed chew for his death and another high-profile player, Curt Schilling, recently underwent treatment for oral cancer which he also blamed on chewing tobacco.). For some mysterious reason, there is a culture of chew deeply embedded in baseball culture. Not only have quite a few ballplayers over the years died of oral or throat cancer (Babe Ruth is the most well-known), but it sets a bad example for teenage baseball players.

However, MLB can’t simply ban chew by players on the field without the approval of the Players’ Association. A chewing tobacco ban is expected to be one of the topics of negotiation between MLB and the Players’ Association in their next contract.

Chew is already banned in all minor league and NCAA baseball parks, so it’s not like there isn’t any precedent.

Chew in baseball, Chewing tobacco, San Francisco

San Francisco votes to ban chew at all ballparks, including AT&T Park

April 24, 2015 Pepe Lepew

The San Francisco Board of Supervisors voted this week to ban chewing tobacco at all ballparks, including the Giants’ home, AT&T Park.

The ordinance, which passed by a unanimous vote, will take a second vote next week, and it sounds like a bit of a formality. The ordinance would not go into effect until Jan. 1, so it would not affect ballplayers and coaches this year.

There is also a similar bill in the California State Assembly to ban chewing tobacco at all ballparks in California — supposedly, this would apply to the Dodgers, A’s and Padres.

The ordinance would ban everyone — even the players — from chewing tobacco publicly in ballparks. I’m wondering how they plan to enforce that if some ballplayers defy the ordinance. I’m kind of trying to imagine them telling some $20 million-a-year athlete to spit out his chew or else he might get a ticket.

Chew is already banned in ballparks at the Minor League level. Smoking is banned in most, if not all, MLB parks (Honestly, that a good question, I don’t know if any parks in the country still allow smoking except in specially designated areas).

Major League Baseball has expressed an interest in banning chew, but it’s an issue that would have to be negotiated with the Player’s Association. I actually didn’t know this. Players are not allowed to be chewing tobacco during television interviews (I wonder if that’s enforced at all.)

I’m hoping that the action by San Francisco supervisors and the bill in the California Assembly will prompt baseball and the player’s association to take action. It’s long overdue. Too many kids getting the idea that chew is cool from watching their favourite players with a chaw in his cheek.

Tony Gwynn died last year of salivary gland cancer and blamed his decades-long chew habit for his cancer. Curt Schilling last year also had a scary bout of oral cancer and likewise blamed chewing tobacco.

Here is a statement on San Francisco’s move by Matt Myers with the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids:

“Today’s vote by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors is truly historic and a huge step toward eliminating tobacco from baseball for good. San Francisco will become the first city to take tobacco out of baseball, setting a powerful example that all of Major League Baseball and the rest of the country should quickly follow. The Board of Supervisors recognizes some simple but important facts – kids see athletes as role models, and when baseball stars use smokeless tobacco the kids who look up to them are much more likely to as well. Our national pastime should have nothing to do with promoting a deadly and addictive product.

Supervisor Mark Farrell has been a true champion on this issue, putting the health of San Francisco’s kids first. San Francisco is leading the nation on this important issue and helping us achieve our goal of the first tobacco-free generation.

When Mayor Lee signs the ordinance into law, we will be on our way to making Major League Baseball completely tobacco-free by 2016. We applaud San Francisco for acting to break baseball’s unhealthy addiction to tobacco and moving us closer to taking tobacco out of baseball once and for all – for the kids, the players and the future.”

Chew in baseball, Chewing tobacco, Curt Schilling, Uncategorized

Curt Schilling’s letter to his 16-year-old self — stay away from chew

April 17, 2015 Pepe Lepew

Curt Schilling wrote an open letter to himself on a site called “The Players’ Tribune” about the dangers of chewing tobacco.

Curt Schilling as you know, was a longtime chewer who last year developed oral cancer. After months of chemo and radiation, he is cancer-free and is now a big anti-chew advocate.

Schilling isn’t my favourite player out there. He’s a bit of a blowhard, I don’t like his politics and I don’t have a lot of patience for athletes who feel the need to rub their faith in people’s noses, but when it comes to the issue of chewing tobacco, he’s on the right side.

A lot of his letter gets preachy — I’ll skip over that — but he says some great things about chew in his piece:

Tomorrow at lunch, a kid is going to dare you to take a dip of Copenhagen. If you say yes, like I did, you’ll be addicted for the rest of your life. Well, the rest of your life up to the point when you are diagnosed with cancer.

I get what you’re thinking. You’re 16 — you’re invincible, just like all your buddies. If you were to jump ahead 33 years, you couldn’t write a better dream than the one your life is going to be.

With one exception.

If you say yes tomorrow, you will become addicted to chewing tobacco and you will get mouth cancer.

OK, there is a long preachy part, I get the point that Schilling is trying to make, but it’s really preachy. Anyway, then Schilling returns to his chew use:

You will develop sores, you will lose your sense of taste and smell. You will develop lesions. You will lose your gums — they will rot. You will have problems with your teeth for the rest of your life.

You will meet men — many good, honest men — who chewed. None of them will have their entire face. They will be missing jaws, chins, cheeks, noses and more. None will live more than a year or two after you meet them. All of them were tobacco chewers.

You will meet Joe Garigiola. He will introduce you to Bill Tuttle. Bill will have no lower face. His entire lower jaw is gone. It was that, or die of mouth cancer. Well, not “that or,” because that mouth cancer would kill him inside of two years.

You will brush your teeth and your mouth will bleed. Not light blood from your gums, but darker blood from deeper inside your mouth. That’s the chew destroying your tissue. You will get message after message, but your addiction will always win, until it wins the biggest battle.

You will get message after message, but your addiction will always win, until it wins the biggest battle

If you say yes tomorrow, you will begin to kill yourself from the inside out. It’s difficult for you to understand in this current phase of your life, but by chewing tobacco, you are jeopardizing your participation in what will be some of your most important moments.

You will risk any chance of seeing your four amazing children graduate high school. You will potentially lose the opportunity to walk your daughter Gabriella (who, like her dad, will be blessed with simple yet outstanding pitching mechanics) down the aisle. You will risk not seeing Gehrig, your oldest son, pitch for four years at a New England college. You may miss your son Grant graduating high school and changing the world. And you may be absent as your youngest son Garrison — who aspires to follow in your father’s footsteps and join the army — masterfully plays goalie with a remarkable passion.

…

Your dad is going to die in five years. You know what’s going to kill him? A heart attack brought on by heart disease and lung cancer caused by tobacco use. He’ll die right in front of you.

Finally, consider this: How many kids will start dipping over the next 32 years because they saw you do it?

Do you want that on you? No?

Then my advice is simple. Tomorrow, at lunch, just say no.

Make the right choice,

– Curt

Chew in baseball, Chewing tobacco, Curt Schilling, Tony Gwynn

Boston Herald columnist calls for banning chewing tobacco in baseball

August 24, 2014 Pepe Lepew

Boston Herald columnist Michael Silverman wrote a powerful column this week that it’s time for Major League Baseball to ban chewing tobacco.

This is hitting home in Boston right now because former Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling, who helped the Sox win two World Series, recently revealed that he is battling a serious form of oral cancer — cancer he blames on his 30-year chewing habit. Schilling’s cancer and Tony Gwynn’s (another chewer) death this summer from salivary gland cancer have put chewing tobacco in baseball front and centre.

Schilling actually did quit chew for a while, but after a year-and-a-half the power of nicotine won and he started dipping again. From Silverman’s column:

“None of it [lectures] was enough to ever make me quit,’’ Schilling said. “The pain that I was in going through this treatment, the second or third day, it was the only thing in my life that I wish I could go back and never have dipped.”

Actually, MLB does want to ban chewing tobacco. Cigarettes are banned in the clubhouse and dugouts. Chew is banned (on the field, mind you) in minor league baseball and in college, but MLB can’t ban it because the Player’s Association won’t allow it.

Silverman writes:

If only the players and Major League Baseball could see that they are dead wrong when it comes to how they rationalize and allow the use of smokeless tobacco rather than eliminating the addictive and cancer-causing substance.

Anyone who heard the higher timbre in the 47-year-old voice of Curt Schilling on WEEI radio and on NESN for the Jimmy Fund Radio-Telethon as he spoke for the first time about his battle with mouth cancer yesterday, or anyone still grieving the loss of 54-year-old Hall of Famer Tony Gwynn in June to a similar cancer, received a chilling reminder that, incredibly, tobacco still has a place in baseball.

Silverman further writes:

Schilling didn’t need an ashtray at Fenway when he played since smoking tobacco had long been banned.

But chewing tobacco?

Oh no, you must understand: That’s totally different. Smoking tobacco’s bad. Chewing the stuff? Well, players in Schilling’s era and players in today’s game can chew all they want. Just don’t let anyone see the telltale circular bulge of a can of snuff in your back pocket, try not to pause in the middle of an interview to spit out the juice and by all means, don’t ask a clubbie to head down to the local convenience store to stock up.

No, MLB forbids and frowns on all of that.

But otherwise, go right ahead: Kill yourself if you want to.

That’s your right.

And finally, Silverman concludes:

Baseball survived when smoking was banned from the clubhouse.

Banning smokeless tobacco won’t kill it, either.

Chew in baseball, Chewing tobacco, Curt Schilling, Tony Gwynn

Curt Schilling reveals he has oral cancer, blames chewing tobacco

August 21, 2014 Pepe Lepew 3 Comments

Hey, back for an update after a long break.

Another baseball, chewing tobacco bombshell: Former Red Sox, Diamondback and Phillies pitcher Curt Schilling revealed yesterday that he is battling oral cancer, and he directly blames his years of chewing tobacco while playing baseball.

“I do believe, without a doubt, unquestionably that chewing was what gave me cancer,” he said [on NESN]. “I’m not going to sit up here from the pedestal and preach about chewing.”

Schilling, of the legendary bloody sock in the ALCS, is the second high-profile baseball player who has been in the news this summer over chewing tobacco and cancer. Several weeks ago, Tony Gwynn died of salivary gland cancer several weeks ago after years of chewing tobacco.

The Schilling case is just the latest reason to ban chewing tobacco in baseball. Currently, minor league players are not allowed to chew tobacco on the field, while in MLB, players are not allowed to smoke cigarettes. However, the players’ union insists on protecting players’ right to continue chewing tobacco on the field. I’ve posted about this repeatedly over the past year, for some mystifying reason, chewing tobacco is deeply, deeply ingrained in the culture of baseball. Why? No one seems to know. No one seems to have any answers for that. Baseball players simply chew. A lot. And a lot of baseball players have gotten oral or mouth cancer — Babe Ruth died of oral cancer and Roger Maris died of some kind of head/neck/oral cancer.

Schilling described the seven weeks of painful radiation therapy he underwent. The therapy caused him to lose 75 pounds because he has trouble eating solid food. He also has trouble generating saliva due to the treatment.

“Recovery is a challenge,” Schilling said. “There are so many things that are damaged during the process. I don’t have any salivary glands, I can’t taste anything and I can’t smell anything right now. And there’s no guarantee they’ll come back.”

Red Sox manager John Farrell talked about Schilling and the culture of chewing tobacco in baseball.

“I don’t want to call it a tradition, because it’s not,” Farrell said Wednesday afternoon. “But it’s a norm in baseball culture.”

“MLB has taken steps to dissuade players from using it through educational programs that are administered to every team,” Farrell said. “It’s even got to the point [in the minor leagues] now where players can be fined if smokeless tobacco is in view of the general public. There have been some of those warnings and penalties levied on some of our players.

“I think we all recognize that it’s addictive and causes cancer. That’s proven. [But] at this time, it’s upon the player to make the conscious decision for himself to use it or not. All we can do is continue educate guys what the ramifications are. … On the heels of the unfortunate passing of Tony Gwynn and what Curt is going through, you would think this would be a current beacon for guys to take note that there’s a price to be paid, if you’re one of the unfortunate ones stricken by cancer.”

Schilling apparently was diagnosed with a “lesion” on his lip 10 or 15 years ago and had the lesion removed. He quit chew for a year-and-a-half, but then got back in the habit. So, even after wising up, even after a lesion was found, the power of nicotine won out.

baseball, Chew in baseball, Chewing tobacco, Kevin Millar, Tony Gwynn, Uncategorized

Kevin Millar on chewing tobacco: “Enough is enough”

July 9, 2014 Pepe Lepew

Last week, Kevin Millar, former “Cowboy Up” Red Sox and one of the more entertaining voices on the MLB Network, appeared on Dan Patrick’s radio show on ESPN Radio, and Dan Patrick specifically asked him a number of questions about chewing tobacco in light of Tony Gwynn’s recent death from cancer.

To recap, Tony Gwynn died of salivary gland cancer, which appeared in the same cheek as where he always chewed. Baseball is being pressured to ban chewing tobacco on the field. The MLB actually wants to do it, but the players’ union is resisting. Chewing tobacco is already banned on the field at the minor league level and by the NCAA. For some bizarre reason, chew is deeply ingrained in the culture of baseball. A culture that is proving difficult to break.

Millar gave a really honest, articulate and poignant interview, not mincing words about how stupid chewing tobacco is and how he badly wants to quit. Here are a few snippets from the interview.

In case fascist YouTube pulls the video:

Dan Patrick interview

Miller on how he always chewed when he went out on the baseball field, and now still has the habit of chewing when he goes out to golf.

“This whole thing (with Tony Gwynn) has really opened my eyes. I know it’s a bad habit. I always did it on the field and now on the golf couse … I’m wired that way. Tuesday, I didn’t grab my can on my way to the golf course because of the whole Tony Gwynn situation. I want to quit. There’s got to be a time when you say ‘enough is enough.'”

Millar said he didn’t start chewing until 1996 when he was given his first can of Copenhagen by former big league pitcher Pascual Perez.

“For some reason … only on the baseball field. I never was a guy who needed it in hotel rooms or on the bus. I don’t know if I thought it was a cool thing to do because you’re a ballplayer or what.”

Patrick brought up the point that some people have claimed that chewing tobacco is a Performance Enhancement Drug (apparently because you get a charge of energy from the nicotine?). Patrick pointed out that perhaps baseball could ban chew on these grounds. Millar disagreed.

” It’s an addiction. It’s a choice. It’s a bad choice. I don’t that it’s a performance enhance. It’s just a bad choice,” he said.

Patrick made his own poignant comment of why did it take Tony Gwynn’s death to get so many ballplayers thinking about chew?

“I hate the fact that it took the death of a hall of famer to realize what it can do to you,” Patrick said. “Why did it take that?”

“We know it’s stupid every time you stick your finger in there and grab a pinch,” Millar responded. He suggested one reason more players don’t think about it is because they think that what happened to Gwynn could never happen to them.

Millar also talked his father, who required a quadruple bypass after just 12 years of smoking. He acknowledged that not everyone who smokes who chews get cancer because there is a genetic component to cancer, but boy, I loved his next statement, because he hits it dead-on. The fact is, not every chewer dies of oral cancer and not every smoker dies of lung cancer, but boy, you sure increase your risk:

“You think ‘it’s not going to happen to me, right. It’s not going to happen to me’ I used to watch Johnny Pesky at 83 years old with a full chew in …. he passed away at 92, 94, he did it for 60 years. At the end of the day, you’re playing Russian roulette,” he said.

“But when it hits home, it makes you think. I have four little kids. I want to be around,” Millar concluded.

Good luck to Kevin Millar in quitting chew.

Chew in baseball, Chewing tobacco, Stephen Strasburg, Tony Gwynn

Stephen Strasburg plans to quit chew due to Tony Gwynn’s death

June 26, 2014 Pepe Lepew

A second, more high-profile player has announced he is quitting chew because of the death from cancer of Tony Gwynn. Stephen Strasburg, star pitcher for the Washington Nationals announced this week he is also quitting chew.

Tony Gwynn, a lifelong chewer, died last week of salivary gland cancer, which prompted the call from numerous people for MLB to ban chewing tobacco on the field. Chew on the field is banned in college and the minor leagues, but the Players’ Association won’t allow MLB to ban it at the highest level. For some mystifying reason that I don’t understand, chew seems to be a big part of baseball culture.

Gwynn, who was only 54 when he died, blamed his chewing on his cancer (the cancer showed up on the same side of the mouth as where he always chewed). Strasburg (like Addison Reed, who also announced this week he will quit chew) played for Tony Gwynn when he was a star at San Diego State University.

According to MLB:

“I think it’s a disgusting habit, looking back on it,” the Nationals right-hander said on Monday. “I was pretty naive when I started. Just doing it here and there, I didn’t think it was going to be such an addiction. … Bottom line is, I want to be around for my family. This is something that can affect people the rest of your life. [Chewing tobacco is] so prevalent in this game. It’s something we all kind of grew up doing.”

Congrats to Stephen and I wish him luck in quitting.

baseball, Chewing tobacco, Tony Gwynn

ESPN, Chicago Sun-Times call for MLB ban on chewing tobacco in wake of Tony Gwynn’s death

June 19, 2014 Pepe Lepew

Jim Caple, writer for ESPN and the Chicago Sun-Times both published editorials this week calling for baseball to ban chew in the wake of Tony Gwynn’s death from cancer. Gwynn, a lifelong chewer, died this week of salivary gland cancer (which originated in the cheek in which he always chewed and he blamed chewing for his cancer.). Gwynn was very outspoken in warning about the dangers of chew in the last couple years of his life.

Jim Caple writes:

Like smoking, chewing tobacco is a revolting, addictive and harmful habit. We are repeatedly warned against both; and yet, people still use both. I do not understand why somebody starts smoking — the warnings are so explicit and the cost of cigarettes is so high – but maybe it’s because his or her friends are doing it. That’s definitely the case with ballplayers and chewing. Players have been chewing in baseball since before there was organ music.

The only way to stop them from doing so is to ban it from the game.

Baseball already has banned chewing tobacco at the minor league level. There are restrictions on it at the major league level as well, but the players union has stubbornly resisted banning its use on the field. And as long as they can use it on the field, they will never stop chewing and spitting and risking their health.

Yes, ballplayers are adults with the same rights as everyone else, but they also are role models who already accept various limitations in exchange for the considerable financial rewards they receive. The use of tobacco in all forms on the field or anywhere in the stadium should be one of these limitations. Tobacco might be a legal substance for adults, but that shouldn’t stop baseball from banning it. Marijuana, for example, has been legalized in Washington and Colorado, but MLB does not allow players to use it when in Seattle or Denver — or anywhere else for that matter.

If amphetamines are banned, then why does MLB allow a substance with known carcinogens that provides players with a “buzz?” If we are so caught up with eliminating performance enhancing drugs from the game, we should be equally passionate about banning health-diminishing products as well.

Gwynn was a wonderful man. The best way to honor him is to eliminate the very thing that killed him. Let’s get rid of chewing tobacco so that no other player suffers and dies as Tony did.

The Chicago Sun-Times writes:

The tobacco tin may be carefully stowed away, but when Major League Baseball players head out to the field there’s no mistaking a cheek bulging with chaw.

In honor of Tony Gwynn, it’s time to end the charade.

MLB players can honor Gwynn — a Hall-of-Fame baseball player and long-time snuff user who died Monday at age 54 after battling salivary gland cancer — by agreeing to ban all smokeless tobacco products on the field.

MLB currently requires players only to keep the tins out of sight during play and prohibits dipping or chewing during interviews.

What a joke.

To make a real impact — to set an example for the millions of kids and young adults who watch professional baseball and idolize ball players — the league should do everything it can to rid itself of this filthy and deadly habit.

But setting the tone from the top that chewing tobacco isn’t welcome on major league ball fields can send a powerful message.

Gwynn got the ball rolling by speaking honestly about what he believed caused his illness.

“Gwynn did something very important; he said early on in his diagnosis that he’d used chewing tobacco and was 99 percent sure that’s how he got it,” said Brian Hill, founder of the Oral Cancer Foundation and an oral cancer survivor. “He was very open about it.

“When our heroes show us they’re vulnerable,” Hill predicted, “they change the world.”

In Gwynn’s honor, we can only hope.

In addition, Dan Shaughnessy with the Boston Globe wrote a column about chew and Tony Gwynn’s death and get this “whistling past the graveyard” quote from Clay Buchholz:

“Cancer runs in my family,’’ said Buchholz, as he sat in front of his locker with a wad of smokeless tobacco wedged between his lower lip and gums. “There’s been people that have never smoked a cigarette or had a dip or chew and they’ve died of lung cancer.

Clay — 85 percent of the people who get lung cancer smoke or smoked. 75 percent of the people who get oral cancer either chew or smoke. So, keep whistling by that graveyard.

At least Dustin Pedroia was a little more contrite:

“I’m trying to stop,’’ said Pedroia. “It’s not a good habit. It’s one of those things, you try like heck. I wish I had never started.

“Everyone crushes me about it. You don’t want any kid to start doing it. Obviously, it’s addicting. It’s not good for you and can cause a lot of problems.

“You try the best you can to stop or not start it. It’s like any bad habit. People do things that aren’t good for you. A lot of things can hurt yourself, whether it’s drinking or tobacco. It’s hard to stop. I’ve stopped a few times and started back up. But I’ve cut back a lot.’’

Cleveland manager Terry Francona once made a high-profile bet to stop using chew. He couldn’t do it.

Former Sox manager Terry Francona keeps several canisters of his favorite chew (Lancaster) within reach whenever he is in uniform.

“It’s the weirdest thing with that,’’ Francona said last week at Fenway. “It’s only when I’m in uniform. The whole year I was out of the dugout, I never used it. Never felt like I wanted it. Never had an urge.

“It’s the same every offseason. I take the uniform off in October and I never think about it. But as soon as I get to spring training and get in uniform, I’m asking myself, ‘Where’s the chew?’ ’’

In 2009, Francona lost a $20,000 bet with Sox CEO Larry Lucchino. The Sox boss (a two-time cancer survivor) wanted to see whether his manager could quit chewing, and Francona barely made it through the first month of the season. Sox players and coaches noted that their manager was unusually agitated.

“I couldn’t make it without the stuff,’’ said Francona. “Nobody wanted to be around me. My coaches and players were telling me to just pay up. Finally, I snapped at a NESN cameraman during a rain delay and I yelled for the clubbie to get me some [expletive] Lancaster.

“Later that day, I wrote a check for $20,000 to Children’s Hospital and I left Larry a phone message telling him that I lost.’’

baseball, Chew in baseball, Chewing tobacco, Mouth cancer

Swallowed chew causes big league player to leave game

April 5, 2014 Pepe Lepew 2 Comments

From the “You just can’t make this stuff up” department.

Colorado Rockies centre fielder Carlos Gomez (hey, didn’t he once play for the Twins, Steve Lardy?) had to leave a game because he felt dizzy and sick to his stomach.

Well, it turns out he got sick because he actually accidentally swallowed his tobacco chew.

… cautious relief gave way to comic relief after the game, when Colorado manager Walt Weiss offered a description of what factored into Gonzalez’s condition to MLB.com’s Thomas Harding:

“He might’ve swallowed some dip or something. He landed hard, knocked the wind out of himself, swallowed some dip, dehydration, all those things were factors.”

Nasty! Carlos, you might want to switch to bubble gum. If for no other reason, your mouth, throat and teeth may thank you 20 years from. Wonder when or if baseball is going to ban dip? They’ve talked about it, but apparently haven’t done so yet. It is banned in the minors.

Amazingly, this is not the first time this has ever happened. According to this article, Josh Ortmon, a pitcher with the Cleveland Indians, ended up on the Disabled List because he pulled a muscle throwing up after swallowing his chew.

Chewing tobacco, tobacco in history

Chewin’ tobacco in Steamboat Willie

December 2, 2013 Pepe Lepew 1 Comment

Went to Disneyland last week and for some reason it jarred this memory for me.

The first ever Mickey Mouse cartoon — Steamboat Willie — had a funny scene in it in which the captain of the steamboat takes a massive chaw of chewing tobacco and starts spitting chew all over the place. It’s actually pretty gross.

How times have changed. This is from 1928, a kids’ cartoon showing someone chewing and spitting tobacco. (Of course, the same cartoon basically shows Mickey torturing small animals to make music.). I wonder if they still show this scene at Disneyland (there’s a theatre that shows Steamboat Willie). If I had had more time, I would have gone and checked it out.