Confronting America’s Smoking Pandemic
A Timeline in Four Parts
In 2014, The Cancer Network, online home of the journal ONCOLOGY, published by MJH Life Sciences, the largest private medical media company in the U.S., invited Alan Blum, MD, director of the Center for the Study of Tobacco and Society (CSTS) to contribute a guest editorial to mark the 50th anniversary of the publication of the landmark report of the Surgeon General on smoking and health. Later that year, The Cancer Network commissioned Dr. Blum and CSTS to produce an illustrated historical timeline of efforts in the U.S. to counteract tobacco use, cigarette marketing, and the tobacco industry. This timeline, “Confronting America’s Smoking Pandemic,” was published by The Cancer Network in four parts during 2015 and 2016. Nearly all of the illustrations are from the CSTS collection.
In 1993, Gene Borio, who created the website tobacco.org, published an encyclopedic timeline on the history of tobacco throughout the world. He has periodically updated it, and it remains an invaluable resource. In 2009, The Texas Medical Association History of Medicine Gallery, coordinated by Betsy Tyson, produced an exhibition, “Smoke and Mirrors: A History of Tobacco Advertising, in conjunction with Joel Dunnington, MD, Dr. Blum, and CSTS.” The exhibition included a timeline available here.