I decided to smoke when I was 14 one January day nearly 70 years ago. I used my weekly allowance of 15 cents to buy a pack of Camels. I felt all grown up as I strutted among the other kids in the park near my home. I imagined the eyes of the younger boys looking at me with envy and respect, and the teenage girls looking at me with admiration and ... dare I think it ... desire.

Keeping up the image in the park that day wasn't difficult, especially while conversing with girls as I puffed one cigarette after the other. After the second cigarette, boy, was I cool! After the tenth cigarette, boy, was I sick! It wasn't sudden, fortunately for everyone around me, but someone must have noticed I was sweating in the 20 degree weather and my ruddy red face was turning a sickly green. I managed to make it to a bunch of bushes before I lost my lunch, breakfast and probably the midnight snack of a dozen hours before.

I didn't suddenly take the pledge and forever swear off smoking. I just didn't smoke any more. Ever. Smoking always has seemed like a really stupid, self-destructive habit. Why would anyone want to put a burning stick of smelly weeds into his mouth and breathe down the fumes. I didn't think of the addiction problems at that time.

Nobody did, and newspaper and magazine readers and radio listeners (no TV yet) were inundated with ads for the wonderful taste of the exotically blended tobaccos. Movie stars like Ronald Reagan and Barbara Stanford posed for the ads, looking real happy while holding the cigarettes. Of course, they were happy. They were making big bucks for posing for the ads.

I did Navy tours during World War II and the Korean War, and just about everyone in barracks and aboard ship smoked. In fact, when payday money ran out, cigarettes became legal tender. I hated the smell of the stuff, especially when confined to the small areas of a ship, but never thought about leading a march to ban them. Nobody did at the time, even C. Everett Koop.

The one time in my life when cigarettes were beneficial was when WWII was ending and I was stationed in the Philippines. We were issued a carton of cigarettes a week at a cost to us of 50 cents. Black market guys paid up to $25 a carton for American cigarettes. At first, I gave my cigarettes to my shipmates, and then handed them out free to the many homeless kids who roamed the streets of Manila. But, when money got tight, I made some $24.50 deals I'm a bit shamed about to this day.

Well, I made that confession of pocketing some unearned profits on cigarettes. Maybe the cigarette companies should come clean and admit they're also making a killing on cigarettes. Or, rather, millions of killings.

Learn more about this author, Ted Sherman.
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