Mail Pouch Tobacco Barn: America's Best Chew

This is the Barn on Pennington Road, established in 1877, and it sits along a main road on the way to Warriors Mark in central Pennsylvania. We have been driving past it for years, probably since about 1986, me with my fingers twitching, always wanting to stop for a few photos.

Somehow, every single time we've been by, the light has not been right, or we've been in a hurry, or there was a vehicle parked in front of the barn, or another vehicle was too close behind us for us to pull over safely, or something else was interfering with my getting a decent shot.

Finally, after all these years, we were out and about, taking my husband's older car for a backroads spin. The last few days have been so gray, as it so often is in winter here. On this day, however, the light was lovely. As we approached the barn, we both sort of decided it together at once: TODAY WAS THE DAY. 

So my husband pulled the car over by the sign for the barn, and I hopped out, and I spent half a minute (yes, half a minute!) taking a half-dozen photos of my quest. (Hey, after 38 years of waiting: sure, I'll call it a quest!)

So here, at last, is a photo of the barn with the Red Man chewing tobacco advertisement on it in Warriors Mark. Red Man brand has been around since 1904. In the early days, tobacco companies would pay barn owners to allow them to place advertisements on barns, which is how I presume this all came about.

The Native American imagery was a defining characteristic of the brand until about 2022, when they removed that imagery and changed the name to simply: America's Best Chew.

Is 38 years too long to wait for a photo you've always wanted? No, I submit to you; it is not. I am delighted to finally present this photo of a Red Man mail pouch tobacco barn, taken on a day with good light. 

And for my soundtrack song, I've got the barn scene from Witness, with Harrison Ford and Kelly McGillis, a personal favorite, with Wonderful World.