View source for Exploding cigar

{{Short description|Cigar that explodes after being lit, usually as a practical joke}}
[[File:Exploding Cigar advert - Popular Mechanics 1917.png|thumb|250px|Exploding cigar pellets advertisement from January 1917 edition of ''Popular Mechanics''<ref>{{cite journal|date=January 1917|title=Exploding Cigar advertisement|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-NsDAAAAMBAJ&pg=RA2-PA136|journal=Popular Mechanics|publisher=Hearst Magazines|page=136|issn=0032-4558}}</ref>]]

An '''exploding cigar''' is a variety of [[cigar]] that [[Explosive material|explodes]] shortly after being lit. Such cigars are normally packed with a minute chemical explosive charge near the lighting end or with a non-chemical device that ruptures the cigar when exposed to heat. Also known as "loaded cigars," the customary intended purpose of exploding cigars is as a [[practical joke]], rather than to cause lasting physical harm to the smoker of the cigar. Nevertheless, the high risk of unintended injuries from their use caused a decline in their manufacture and sale.

Although far rarer than their prank cousins, the use of exploding cigars as a means to kill or attempt to kill targets in real life has been claimed, and is well represented as a fictional plot device. The most famous case concerning the intentionally deadly variety was an alleged plot by the [[Central Intelligence Agency|CIA]] in the 1960s to assassinate [[Cuba]]n leader [[Fidel Castro]]. Notable real-life incidents involving the non-lethal variety include an exploding cigar purportedly given by [[Ulysses S. Grant]] to an acquaintance and a dust-up between Turkish military officers and [[Ernest Hemingway]] after he pranked one of them with an exploding cigar.

==Manufacture and decline==
[[File:Exploding cigar comic (darkened).png|thumb|Exploding cigar comic from July 8, 1919 edition of the ''Oakland Tribune'' by [[Fontaine Fox]].<ref name="Fox">{{cite journal|last=Fox|first=Fontaine|date=April 1928|title=Fontaine Fox Insists He Is an Inventor|journal=Popular Science Monthly|publisher=Bonnier Corporation|volume=112|issue=4|page=35|issn=0161-7370 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=EisDAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA35}}</ref>{{Cref2|footnote 1}}]]

The largest manufacturer and purveyor of exploding cigars in the United States during the middle of the 20th century was the S. S. Adams Company, which, according to ''[[The Saturday Evening Post]]'', made more exploding cigars and other gag novelty items as of 1946 than its next eleven competitors combined.<ref name="SEP">{{cite book|author= Maurice Zolotow|title=The Jumping Snakes of S.S. Adams|editor=The Saturday Evening Post|editor-link=The Saturday Evening Post|publisher=[[Curtis Publishing Company]]|date=June 1, 1946|id =[http://www.ssadams.com/zolotow.html Online text of article]. Retrieved on June 9, 2008}}</ref>

The company was founded by [[Soren Sorensen Adams]], dubbed the "king of the professional pranksters", who invented and patented many common gag novelties such as [[sneezing powder]], [[itching powder]], the [[dribble glass]] and the [[Joy Buzzer|joy buzzer]].<ref name="SEP" /><ref>The New York Times Company (October 21, 1963). Obituaries section: [https://www.nytimes.com/1963/10/21/archives/soren-s-adams-84-novelties-maker.html&scp=1&sq=soren+s+adams%2C+84%2C+novelties+maker&st=p Soren S. Adams, 84, Novelties Maker] (Associated Press). Retrieved on June 9, 2008.</ref> The largest New York–based manufacturer of exploding cigars was Richard Appel, a German refugee from [[Nuremberg]], who in or about 1940 opened a gag novelty factory on Manhattan's [[Lower East Side]].<ref>CondéNet (2008). Abstract of the March 30, 1940 issue of [[The New Yorker]], p. 13: [http://www.newyorker.com/archive/1940/03/30/1940_03_30_013_TNY_CARDS_000180141 Gagman] by Maurice Zolotow. Retrieved on June 10, 2008.</ref>

By the time exploding cigars were being turned out by manufacturers such as Adams and Appel, the chemical explosive variety had fallen out of favor.<ref name="SEP" /> According to Adams, the large-scale switch to a non-chemical device occurred in approximately 1915 in the aftermath of a death caused by a homemade exploding cigar rigged with dynamite.<ref name="SEP" /> Though exploding cigars were not normally rigged with dynamite but with explosive caps using a less powerful incendiary,<ref name="PopMech">{{cite journal|last=Deitch|first=James|date=March 1952|title=I Was the Gadgeteer For a TV Madhouse|journal=Popular Mechanics|publisher=Hearst Magazines|volume=97|issue= 3|pages=258, 260|issn=0032-4558}}</ref> following the incident, a number of US states banned the product altogether.<ref name="SEP" /> The replacement for chemical explosives was a metal spring mechanism, bound with cord—as the victim puffed away, the cord burned through, causing the device to spring open, thus rupturing the cigar's end.<ref name="SEP" /><ref name="PopMech" />

However, the decline in the use and advertisement of the exploding cigar was neither complete, nor permanent, and they can be obtained worldwide. In the United States, makers include Don Osvaldo and Hawkins Joke Shop. However, their availability in the US is limited, as some states, such as Massachusetts, have banned their sale entirely.

Prank exploding cigars have caused many injuries over their history. For example, in 1902 one Edward Weinschreider sued a cigar shop for an exploding cigar that burned his hand so badly three of his fingers had to be amputated.<ref>[[Brooklyn Daily Eagle]] (October 22, 1902). Front page: ''Loaded Cigar Damage Suit''. Digitized version available through the [http://www.brooklynpubliclibrary.org/eagle/ Brooklynpubliclibrary.org] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071019230402/http://www.brooklynpubliclibrary.org/eagle/ |date=October 19, 2007 }}. Retrieved on June 9, 2008.</ref> As has been observed by one legal scholar, "[t]he utility of the exploding cigar is so low and the risk of injury so high as to warrant a conclusion that the cigar is defective and should not have been marketed at all."<ref>Steenson, Michael K. ''A Comparative Analysis of Minnesota Products Liability Law and the Restatement (Third) of Torts: Products Liability.'' 24 William Mitchell Law Review 1 (1998)</ref> Laws have been enacted banning the sale of exploding cigars entirely, such as Chapter 178 of Massachusetts' Acts and Resolves, passed by its legislature in 1967.<ref>{{cite book|last=Massachusetts. General Court|title=Acts and Resolves Passed by the General Court  |publisher=Secretary of the Commonwealth|year=1967|page=102|isbn=0-543-93177-3}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Shanken|first=Marvin R.|title=Cigar Companion|publisher=Running Press|location=Philadelphia|year=2005|edition=illustrated|page=178|isbn=978-0-7624-1957-9}}</ref>

==In fiction==
Both prank and intentionally deadly exploding cigars have been featured in numerous works of fiction, spanning many forms of media including literature, film, comics books, cartoons and others. A well-known use of the exploding cigar in literature, for example, appears in [[Thomas Pynchon]]'s 1973 novel, ''[[Gravity's Rainbow]]''. In it, the character Etzel Ölsch symbolically betrays his death wish by eagerly smoking a cigar he knows to be of the prank explosive variety.<ref>{{cite book|author=Thomas Pynchon|title=Gravity's Rainbow|publisher=Penguin Books|location=New York|page=300|year=1973|isbn=0-14-018859-2}}</ref><ref>{{cite book | author = Thomas Moore | title = The Style of Connectedness: Gravity's Rainbow and Thomas Pynchon | publisher = University of Missouri Press | location = Columbia | page = [https://archive.org/details/styleofconnected00moor/page/213 213] | year = 1987 | isbn = 0-8262-0625-5 | url = https://archive.org/details/styleofconnected00moor/page/213 }}</ref> Other book examples include [[Robert Coover]]'s 1977 novel, ''[[The Public Burning]]'', where a fictionalized [[Richard Nixon]] hands an exploding cigar to [[Uncle Sam]],<ref>{{cite book|author=Brian Evenson|title=Understanding Robert Coover|publisher=University of South Carolina Press|location=Columbia, SC|page=[https://archive.org/details/understandingrob00even_0/page/118 118]|year=2003|isbn=1-57003-482-6|url=https://archive.org/details/understandingrob00even_0/page/118}}</ref> and Sherburne James' ''Death's Clenched Fist'' (1982), in which a [[Tammany Hall]] politico of the 1890s is murdered with an exploding cigar.<ref>{{cite book|author=Lynda G. Adamson and Lynda A. T. Dickinson|title=American Historical Fiction: An Annotated Guide to Novels for Adults and Young Adults|publisher=Oryx Press|location=Phoenix, AZ|page=178|year=1999|isbn=1-57356-067-7}}</ref>

Film examples include [[Cecil B. DeMille]]'s 1921 romance ''[[Fool's Paradise (1921 film)|Fool's Paradise]]'', wherein the main character is blinded by an exploding cigar;<ref>{{cite book|author=Robert S. Birchard and Kevin Thomas|title=Cecil B. DeMille's Hollywood|publisher=University Press of Kentucky|location=Lexington, KY|page=165|year=2004|isbn=0-8131-2324-0}}</ref> [[Laurel and Hardy]]'s ''[[Great Guns]]'' (1941), which features a gag in which tobacco is replaced by gunpowder;<ref>{{cite book|author=Wes D. Gehring|title=Laurel and Hardy: A Bio-bibliography|publisher=Greenwood Publishing Group|location=Westport, CT|page=98|year=1990|isbn=0-313-25172-X}}</ref> in Road To Morocco (1942) with Bing Crosby and Bob Hope features the duo mixing gunpowder with tobacco in order to create chaos and escape a desert sheik with their girls; the [[Elke Sommer]] vehicle, ''[[Deadlier Than the Male]]'' (1967), where a murder by exploding cigar is a key plot element;<ref>{{cite book | author= Donald L. Barlett and James B. Steele|title=Howard Hughes: His Life & Madness|publisher=W. W. Norton & Company | location =New York and London | page=547|year=2004|isbn = 0-393-32602-0}}</ref> in [[The Beatles]]' 1968 animated feature film, ''[[Yellow Submarine (film)|Yellow Submarine]]'', where an exploding cigar is used to rebuff a psychedelic boxing monster;<ref>{{cite video|date=June 6, 1968|title=[[Yellow Submarine (film)|Yellow Submarine]]|people=[[The Beatles]]|publisher=Apple Films}}</ref> the 1984 comedy ''[[Top Secret!]]'', in which [[Omar Sharif]]'s British secret agent character is pranked with an exploding cigar by a blindman;<ref>{{cite news|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=VekLAAAAIBAJ&sjid=z1kDAAAAIBAJ&pg=3933,1624298|title=Films|publisher=St. Petersburg Independent|page=13-B|date=June 22, 1984}}</ref> and in the 2005 film ''[[V for Vendetta (film)|V for Vendetta]]'', where the main antagonist's cigar is swapped with an exploding one during a comedy skit.

The appearance of exploding cigars in the Warner Bros. cartoon franchises, [[Merrie Melodies]] and [[Looney Tunes]] was fairly common, often coupled with the explosion resulting in the pranked character appearing in [[blackface]]. Some examples include:  ''[[Lauren Bacall|Bacall]] to Arms'' (1942), wherein an animated [[Humphrey Bogart]] gets zapped by an exploding cigar leaving him in blackface,<ref>{{cite book | author= Kevin S. Sandler|title=Reading the Rabbit: Explorations in Warner Bros. Animation|publisher=Rutgers University Press|location=New Brunswick|page=238|year=1998|isbn=0-8135-2538-1}}</ref> 1949's ''[[Mississippi Hare]]'', where the character Colonel Shuffle likewise ends up in blackface after the explosion,<ref>{{cite video|date=February 26, 1949|people=[[Chuck Jones]] (director)|title=[[Mississippi Hare]]|publisher=[[Warner Bros. Pictures]]}}</ref> 1952's ''[[Rabbit's Kin]]'', in which [[Pete Puma]] offers [[Bugs Bunny]] an exploding cigar (true to form, Bugs Bunny turns the tables on the hapless feline, placing the cigar in Pete's mouth after he is dazed and lighting it with expected results),<ref>{{cite video|date=November 15, 1952|people=[[Robert McKimson]] (director)|title=[[Rabbit's Kin]]|publisher=[[Warner Bros. Pictures]]}}</ref> and 1964's ''[[Dr. Devil and Mr. Hare]]'', where the [[Tasmanian Devil (Looney Tunes)|Tasmanian Devil]] successfully gets Bugs Bunny to smoke an exploding cigar.<ref>{{cite video|date=March 28, 1964|people=[[David H. DePatie]] (director)|title=[[Dr. Devil and Mr. Hare]]|publisher=[[Warner Bros. Pictures]]}}</ref>

Other media examples include television appearances such as when Peter Falk's ''[[Columbo (TV series)|Columbo]]'' must solve an industrial magnate's death by exploding cigar in the episode "Short Fuse" (1972),<ref>{{cite news|title=Television Key Previews|date=January 19, 1972|publisher=Bridgeport Post, The (Bridgeport, CT)}}</ref> in a season four episode of the United States television, [[CBS]] crime drama, ''[[CSI: NY]]'' titled "[[Child's Play (CSI: NY episode)|Child's Play]]", wherein the forensic team investigate the death of a man killed by an exploding cigar,<ref>{{cite web|year=2008|url=http://www.tv.com/csi-ny/childs-play/episode/1143393/summary.html|title=Child's Play|publisher=CNET Networks, Inc|author=TV.com|access-date=June 8, 2008|archive-date=July 20, 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080720063626/http://www.tv.com/csi-ny/childs-play/episode/1143393/summary.html|url-status=dead}}</ref> and in a 1966 episode of ''[[The Avengers (TV series)|The Avengers]]'' entitled "[[List of The Avengers episodes|A Touch of Brimstone]]";<ref>{{cite book|author=James Chapman|title=Saints and Avengers: British Adventure Series of the 1960s|publisher=I.B. Tauris|location=London|page=81|year=2003|isbn=1-86064-754-5}}</ref> in video games such as ''[[Day of the Tentacle]]'' where Hoagie can offer George Washington an exploding cigar;<ref>{{cite web|year=2008|url=http://games.ign.com/halloffame/maniac-mansion-ii-day-of-the-tentacle.html|title=Maniac Mansion: Day of the Tentacle|publisher=IGN Entertainment, Inc|author=The Videogame Hall of Fame|access-date=June 8, 2008|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080510031924/http://games.ign.com/halloffame/maniac-mansion-ii-day-of-the-tentacle.html|archive-date=May 10, 2008}}</ref> and as a stock device by the [[Joker (character)|Joker]] in [[Batman]] comic books. For example, in ''[[Batman (comic book)|Batman]]'' #251 (1973) entitled "The Joker's Five-Way Revenge", an exploding cigar containing [[nitroglycerin]] is used by the Joker to kill one of the members of his gang.<ref>{{cite book|author=Peter Middleton|title=The Inward Gaze: Masculinity and Subjectivity in Modern Culture|publisher=Routledge|location=London and New York|page=30|year=1992|isbn=0-415-07328-6}}</ref> [[The Adventures of Tintin]] comics have occasionally utilized prank exploding cigars against [[Captain Haddock]].

==In reality==
===Ulysses S. Grant's delayed gift===
According to a 1932 [[Associated Press]] story, U.S. President [[Ulysses S. Grant]] gave Horace Norton, the founder of a now defunct college in Chicago, an exploding cigar soon after being introduced to him, but the "joke" wasn't revealed until many years later.<ref name="AP">{{Cite news|agency=Associated press|title=Gen. Grant's Gift Cigar Retains Wartime Power|newspaper=[[Los Angeles Times]], as quoted in full at Snopes.com with citation|page=5|date=December 20, 1932|url=http://www.snopes.com/history/american/grantcigar.asp|access-date=June 2, 2008}}</ref>

According to the story, unaware of the nature of the gift, Norton saved the cigar, keeping it on display in his college's museum. Years later, when the school was shutting its doors for good, the alumni thought it would be a fitting gesture to smoke the cigar at the college's annual reunion. The honor was given to Winstead Norton, Horace's grandson. During the sober speech he was presenting, Winstead lit the cigar, and after two puffs, it exploded.<ref name="AP" /> A 1952 news report contradicts one detail, holding that the explosion ultimately occurred at a family reunion rather than the alumni affair noted.<ref>{{cite news|title=This Country Needs Good 5-Cent Exploding Cigar!|date=April 1, 1954|publisher=Dixon Evening Telegraph (Dixon, Ill)}}</ref>

The tale of "Grant's cigar" has unquestionably been embellished over time.<ref name="Mikkelson">{{cite web|author=Barbara Mikkelson and David Mikkelson|url=http://www.snopes.com/history/american/grantcigar.asp|title=Delayed Grantification|publisher=Snope.com (Urban Legends Reference Pages)|date=April 3, 2006|access-date=March 27, 2012}}</ref> The possibility exists that the tale is a hoax or [[urban legend]] or that the cigar was tampered with by someone after Grant's purported presentation.<ref name="Mikkelson" />{{Cref2|footnote 3}}

===Ernest Hemingway===
Reportedly, [[Ernest Hemingway]], urged on by a group of journalists with whom he was drinking at the Palace Hotel bar in [[Rapallo]], [[Italy]], presented an exploding cigar to one of four bodyguards of Turkish general [[İsmet İnönü]]. When the cigar "went off", all four guards drew their guns and aimed at Hemingway. He apparently escaped without any grievous bodily injury.<ref>{{cite book|author=Ernest Hemingway, with an introduction and notes by Nicholas Gerogiannis|title=Complete Poems: Ernest Hemingway|url=https://archive.org/details/completepoems0000hemi_d5c7|url-access=registration|publisher=University of Nebraska Press|location=Lincoln, NE and London|page=[https://archive.org/details/completepoems0000hemi_d5c7/page/142 142]|year=1992|isbn=0-8032-7259-6}}</ref>

===CIA plot to assassinate Castro===
[[File:Mad cover Oct 1963.jpg|thumb|Cover of October 1963 issue (#82) of [[Mad (magazine)|Mad Magazine]]. Written by [[Al Jaffee]] and painted by [[Norman Mingo]]<ref name="Ohio">{{cite journal|author=Ohio State University Press|year=1994|journal=Inks: Cartoon and Comic Art Studies|title=Not provided|page=46|publisher=Ohio State University Press|location=Columbus, Ohio|issn=1071-9156|oclc=28763232}}</ref>]]

In the late 1950s under [[Dwight D. Eisenhower]]'s presidential administration and in the early 1960s under [[John F. Kennedy]]'s, the CIA had been brainstorming and implementing plots to assassinate [[Fidel Castro]], going as far as enlisting the help of [[American Mafia]] leaders such as [[John Roselli|Johnny Roselli]] and [[Santo Trafficante, Jr.]] to assist in carrying out their plans.<ref name="Ultimate">{{cite book|author= Lamar Waldron and Thom Hartmann |title=Ultimate Sacrifice: John and Robert Kennedy, the Plan for a Coup in Cuba, and the Murder of JFK|publisher=Carroll & Graf Publishers|location=New York|page=409|year=2005|isbn=0-7867-1832-3}}</ref><ref name="Perilous">{{cite book|author=Lucien S. Vandenbroucke|title=Perilous Options: Special Operations as an Instrument of U.S. Foreign Policy|publisher=Oxford University Press|location=New York|page=[https://archive.org/details/perilousoptionss00vand/page/30 30]|year=1993|isbn=0-19-504591-2|url=https://archive.org/details/perilousoptionss00vand/page/30}}</ref> Many assassination ideas were floated by the CIA in the covert operation which was dubbed "[[Cuban Project|Operation Mongoose]]."<ref name="Borders">{{cite book|author=Stewart Brewer and Michael LaRosa|title=Borders and Bridges: A History of U.S.-Latin American Relations|publisher=Greenwood Publishing Group|location=Westport, Ct.|page =123|year=2006|isbn=0-275-98204-1}}</ref> The most infamous was the CIA's alleged plot to capitalize on Castro's well known love of cigars by slipping into his supply a very real and lethal "exploding cigar."<ref>{{cite news|date=April 3, 2006|url=https://www.theguardian.com/cuba/story/0,,1835930,00.html|title=638 ways to kill Castro|work=[[The Guardian]]|first=Duncan|last=Campbell}}<p>{{*}}{{cite book|author=Malcolm Chandler and John Wright|title=Modern World History|publisher=Heinemann Education Publishers|location=Oxford|page=282|year=2001|isbn=0-435-31141-7}}</p><p>{{*}}{{cite book|first1=Joseph J.|last1=Hobbs|first2=Christopher L.|last2= Salter|title=Essentials Of World Regional Geography|publisher=Thomson Brooks/Cole|location=Toronto|page=543|edition=5th|year=2006|isbn=0-534-46600-1}}</p><p>{{*}}{{cite book|author=Derek Leebaert|title=The Fifty-year Wound: How America's Cold War Victory Shapes Our World|publisher=Little, Brown and Company|location=Boston|page=[https://archive.org/details/fiftyyearwoundtr00leeb/page/302 302]|year=2006|isbn=0-316-51847-6|url=https://archive.org/details/fiftyyearwoundtr00leeb/page/302}}</p><p>{{*}}{{cite book|author=Fred Inglis|title=The People's Witness: The Journalist in Modern Politics|publisher=Yale University Press|location=New Haven and London|page=[https://archive.org/details/peopleswitnessjo00ingl/page/223 223]|year=2002|isbn=0-300-09327-6|url=https://archive.org/details/peopleswitnessjo00ingl/page/223}}</p><p>{{*}}{{cite news|author-link=BBC News|author=BBC News|title=Castro: Profile of the great survivor|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/244974.stm|date=February 19, 2008}}</p></ref> A November 4, 1967 ''[[Saturday Evening Post]]'' article reported that during Castro's visit to the [[United Nations]] in 1966 a CIA agent approached [[NYPD]] chief inspector Michael J. Murphy with a plan to get Castro to smoke an exploding cigar.<ref>{{cite news|title=U.S. Agency Planned to Blow Off Castro's Head|last=Associated Press|date=October 19, 1967|publisher=The Lethbridge Herald (Lethbridge, Alberta)}}</ref>

While numerous sources state the exploding cigar plot as fact, at least one source asserts it to be simply a myth,<ref>{{cite book|author=David Hambling|title=Weapons Grade: How Modern Warfare Gave Birth to Our High-Tech World|publisher=Carroll & Graf Publishers|location=New York|page=[https://archive.org/details/weaponsgradehowm00hamb/page/391 391]|year=2005|isbn=0-7867-1769-6|url=https://archive.org/details/weaponsgradehowm00hamb/page/391}}</ref> while another suggests it was merely supermarket tabloid fodder.<ref>{{cite book|author=Charles R. Morris|title=A Time of Passion: America, 1960–1980|publisher=Harper & Row|location=New York|page=[https://archive.org/details/timeofpassioname00morr/page/210 210]|year=1984|isbn=0-06-039023-9|url=https://archive.org/details/timeofpassioname00morr/page/210}}</ref> One source theorizes that the story does have its origins in the CIA, but that it was never seriously proposed by them; rather, the plot was made up by the CIA as an intentionally "silly" idea to feed to those questioning them about their plans for Castro, in order to deflect scrutiny from more serious areas of inquiry.<ref name="Ultimate" />{{Cref2|footnote 2}}

Whether true or not, the CIA's exploding cigar assassination plot inspired the cover of the October 1963 issue (#82) of [[Mad (magazine)|Mad Magazine]]. Conceived by [[Al Jaffee]], the cover (pictured at right) bears the headline, "You'll Get a BANG out of this issue of Mad Magazine", and features a painting by [[Norman Mingo]] depicting Castro in the act of lighting a cigar wrapped with a [[cigar band]] on which is drawn [[Alfred E. Neuman]] with his fingers plugging his ears, awaiting the explosion.<ref name="Ohio" /><ref>[http://www.rocketsuperb.com/lout_shelter/mad_fidel_021908.jpg October 1963 Mad Magazine Cover] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110715193650/http://www.rocketsuperb.com/lout_shelter/mad_fidel_021908.jpg |date=2011-07-15 }}. Retrieved on June 4, 2008.</ref> An exploding cigar is also featured on the poster for the [[Channel 4]] British Documentary, ''[[638 Ways to Kill Castro]]'', which shows Castro with a cigar in his mouth that has a fuse projecting from the end and a lit match approaching.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.638waystokillcastro.com/about.asp|title=638 ways to kill Castro|publisher=638waystokillcastro.com|access-date=May 28, 2008|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080615235556/http://www.638waystokillcastro.com/about.asp|archive-date=June 15, 2008}}</ref> An exploding cigar was tested on a season 2 episode of ''[[Deadliest Warrior]]'', KGB vs. CIA;<ref name ="Spike">{{cite web|url=http://www.spike.com/full-episodes/vtr1nq/deadliest-warrior-the-aftermath-cia-vs-kgb-season-22-ep-209a|title=The Aftermath – CIA vs. KGB – Episode 209a|publisher=Spike TV|access-date=December 18, 2011}}</ref> the cigar completely destroyed the upper and lower jaw of a gel head, but was determined to be very unreliable due to its timed fuse and small explosive payload.<ref name ="Spike" />

==See also==
* [[List of practical joke topics]]
{{-}}

==Footnotes==
{{Cnote2 Begin|liststyle=upper-alpha|colwidth=40em}}
{{Cnote2|footnote 1|Describing the comic in [[Popular Science|Popular Science Monthly]] in an April 1928 article, Fox stated, "There are always fools in the world who think it is funny to hand out exploding cigars, so I drew a picture of a yokel enjoying such a gift cigar in complete safety. This device included a bamboo tube extending through an umbrella parallel to the handle so that a cigar inserted in the ferrule end might be safely smoked from behind the shelter of the umbrella."<ref name="Fox" />}}

{{Cnote2|footnote 2|Certainly there were numerous incredible plots to do in Castro that are ascribed to the CIA, including among others: poisoning his cigars<ref name="Perilous" /> (a box of the lethal smokes were actually prepared and delivered to Havana<ref>{{cite book|author=Charles Schudson|title=Watergate in American Memory: How We Remember, Forget, and Reconstruct the Past|publisher=Basic Books|location=New York|page=[https://archive.org/details/watergateinameri0000schu/page/45 45]|year=1992|isbn=0-46509084-2|url=https://archive.org/details/watergateinameri0000schu/page/45}}</ref>); exploding seashells to be planted at a [[scuba diving]] site; a gift diving [[wetsuit]] impregnated with noxious bacteria<ref name="Spymaster">{{cite book|author=Ted Shackley and Richard A. Finney|title=Spymaster: my life in the CIA|publisher=Potomac Books|location=Dulles, Virginia|page=57|year=1992|isbn=1-57488-915-X}}</ref> and mold spores,<ref>{{cite book|author=Fidel Castro and Ignacio Ramonet|title=Fidel Castro: My Life: a Spoken Autobiography|publisher=Simon and Schuster|location=Washington D.C.|page=262|year=2008|isbn=978-1-41655-328-1}}</ref> or with lethal chemical agents; infecting Castro's [[Diving regulator|scuba regulator]] apparatus with [[Mycobacterium tuberculosis|tuberculous bacilli]];<ref>{{cite book|author=Humberto Fontova|title=Fidel: Hollywood's Favorite Tyrant|publisher=Regnery Publishing|location=Washington D.C.|page=[https://archive.org/details/fidelhollywoodsf0000font/page/94 94]|year=2005|isbn=0-89526-043-3|url=https://archive.org/details/fidelhollywoodsf0000font/page/94}}</ref> dousing his handkerchiefs, his tea, and his coffee with other lethal bacteria; having a former lover to slip him poison pills;<ref name="Guardian">{{cite news|date=April 3, 2006|url=https://www.theguardian.com/cuba/story/0,,1835930,00.html|title=638 ways to kill Castro|publisher=The Guardian Unlimited|location=London|first=Duncan|last=Campbell}}</ref><ref name="Spymaster" /> and exposing him to various other poisoned items such as a fountain pen and even ice cream.<ref name="Borders"/> The U.S. Senate's [[Church Committee]] of 1975 stated that it had confirmed at least eight separate CIA run plots to assassinate Castro.<ref>{{cite book|author=Gus Russo|title=Live by the Sword: The Secret War Against Castro and the Death of JFK|publisher=Bancroft Press|location=Baltimore|page=[https://archive.org/details/livebyswordsecre00russ/page/83 83]|year=1998|isbn=1-890862-01-0|url=https://archive.org/details/livebyswordsecre00russ/page/83}}</ref> Fabian Escalante, who was long tasked with protecting the life of Castro, contends that there have been 638 separate CIA assassination schemes or attempts on Castro's life.<ref name="Guardian" />}}

{{Cnote2|footnote 3|Barbara and David Mikkelson, founders of [[Snopes.com]], known for its investigations into possible urban legends, write that "Aside from [one] minor inconsistency&nbsp;... we haven't been able to uncover much of anything else about this legend. All versions of it apparently stem from the same Associated Press account, and we haven't found any other evidence of a connection or meeting between Ulysses S. Grant and Horace Norton. Without knowing even the name of the correspondent who provided the report to the Associated Press, we don't have much else to go by in trying to trace it back to a source. It could be a true story, it could be a bit of amusing fiction fabricated by (or fed to) a reporter, or it could be a literally true but staged event..."<ref name="Mikkelson" />}}
{{Cnote2 End}}

==References==
{{Reflist|colwidth=25em}}

{{good article}}

[[Category:Cigars]]
[[Category:Practical joke devices]]
[[Category:Explosives|Cigar]]