When I first wrote this series, I couldn’t find much about the Cyrilla Cigar factory. While I was digging a little deeper on other posts, a few new sources popped up in my research. I’m happy to say I was able to put together a few puzzling pieces of information and make sense out of them.
Chicago years
The Cyrilla cigar brand has been made at least since the early 1900’s. I first found the Cyrilla brand mentioned in 1905 being manufactured by E. Fernbach & Sons of Chicago. Julius Fernbach, one of the “Sons” seems to have taken over at some point and renamed the company Julius Fernbach & Company (JF&Co) also based out of Chicago. The Cyrilla brand was very popular in the Chicago area, causing J. Fernbach to construct a new factory in Chicago in 1914.
By 1919, Julius Fernbach & Company looked to move from Chicago to Tampa. Julius Fernbach, the founder and President of the company was 52 years old at the time and when the time came, he remained in Chicago. At the time the company’s two big brands were Cyrilla and General Forbes. Julius Fernbach would retire from the company around 1945 and move to Akron, OH where he died on July 25, 1953. He was 86 at the time of his death.
Tampa Years
In 1921, J. Fernbach & Co. moved to Tampa. One of the Chicago employees, Jose Arango also made the move to oversee operations and manage production.
At some point that is not clear to me, the Cyrilla brand once made by JF&Co was made by Jose Arango & Co. (JA&Co.)
Photo Gallery (click images for full view)
- Top Row: Comparison artwork between J. Fernbach & Co and Jose Arango & Co.
- Middle row: Modern design and cigars. Photos courtesy of Arango Cigar Co.
- Bottom row: Cigar tin art and Cyrilla Factory in it’s heyday
Modern times
In 1992, Arango Cigar Co. of Northbrook, IL trademarks the name Cyrilla and currently distributes the cigar which is made in the Dominican Republic.
The factory building is now used by the Hillsborough Community College as an administrative building.