|
Home > What's New > Remembering a Roller
Remembering a Roller
Posted: Monday, March 20, 2006
By David Savona
South Florida, a few weeks ago. I was lighting a La Gloria Cubana, minutes after I had dropped in on Ernesto Perez-Carrillo on Calle Ocho. "Come here," Ernie said to me, heading to his aging room. "I want to show you something."
He walked into the aging room, puffing on his ever-present cigar. Inside, bundles of La Glorias and El Rico Habanos that had been rolled at this small factory lay sleeping. Most La Gloria Cubanas are made in the Dominican Republic, but the original factory in Little Havana remains, and the rollers here produce wonderful cigars. The recently refurbished factory and now has a glossy cigar store attached to the rolling galleria. It's become a spot for cigar aficionados to visit, to see a bit of cigar history.
Ernie sat down on a very low stool in the dimly lit aging room. On the bottom shelf was a lone cigar, an empty cup of Cuban coffee and a flower in a makeshift vase. Behind the vase, tucked against the wall, was an urn.
Inside are the ashes of Armando Moré, who used to roll cigars at El Credito, the home of the La Gloria Cubana brand. Moré was an amazing roller. Ernie told me his résumé included stints at Cuba's Farach, Romeo y Julieta and Partagas factories. After leaving Cuba, Moré worked in New Jersey with Rolando Reyes Sr., then headed south to Florida, eventually joining El Credito.
"He used to tell me how, when he started, he went from a first grade roller to a sixth grade roller," Ernie said, the equivalent of jumping from private to major. Moré was a constant companion at Cigar Aficionado Big Smokes in the early days. He was a large man, about 6 feet 3 inches, and always wore a white Panama hat. At Big Smokes he would roll 250 cigars in a session, which he would hand out to attendees. That's a brisk rolling pace.
Moré died in 1996, at the age of 62, while planning a trip to Cuba to visit his mother, whom he hadn't seen for 15 years.
"When he passed away, he had no family here," said Perez-Carrillo, stooping by the urn. "We keep him here. We buy flowers for him, bring coffee, a cigar. Every Friday we get flowers. Three to four people take care of it. They do it out of love."
You don't often hear the heads of cigar companies talk with such reverence about their cigar rollers, the men and women who craft the cigars by hand, but this man clearly made an impact on Perez-Carrillo, one of the most highly respected cigar men in the world.
"He was so influential on my personal life -- giving me advice, how to handle people, how to be around cigarmakers. It's not like they're regular laborers. They're artists," said Perez-Carrillo. "He was such a master at what he did. He's one of the persons that really helped me get the feel for what making a cigar is all about."
Also in Cigar News:
| 
Cigar Aficionado RSS Feed