Cigars and Guns

Whenever I plan an excursion to Gunsite Academy in Paulden, AZ, for training ,there are three essential items I always take with me: three firearms (two for the specific five-day course I am taking plus a backup should one of those guns become inoperative), a minimum of 500 rounds of ammunition and a box of cigars.

By the end of the grueling, five-day course, no matter which one it may be, I have acquired an enhanced confidence in my shooting skills, the 500 rounds of ammo will have been pretty much depleted and the box of cigars will be completely empty, having been smoked and enjoyed off range and after-hours by myself, my fellow shooters and a number of Gunsite instructors, including Gunsite Training Director Dave Hartman, Gunsite Rangemaster Lew Gosnell as well as Ken Campbell, CEO of Gunsite Academy.

“After shooting, as we wind down in the evening, especially at the end of the day of teaching a class at Gunsite, a cigar is a great way to reflect on the events of the day, how the students are doing and how we can better approach them tomorrow,” says Campbell. “The rush of the day is past and now we can relax (and) enjoy the process of finding the right cigar, rolling in between your fingers, the aroma and the lighting. Then you enjoy the smoke and the ‘cigar friendships.’”

Indeed, there is a definite bond that links shooting with cigar smoking, forged by the physical and philosophical similarities between gunsmoke and cigar smoke. And, it’s not just because both activities involve a flash of fire followed by a whitish-gray cloud, although one can make the correlation between slamming a magazine home and clipping the foot of a cigar, racking the slide and lighting up and firing the first shot with taking that first puff. But it goes deeper than that.

“I think I enjoy the solitude,” says NRA Media Editorial Director Mark A. Keefe IV, who enjoys a Dominican Macanudo, a Partagas Lonsdale or an Ashton 898, which he calls the “perfect non-Cuban cigar.”  “It gives one time to think. And the flavor of a good cigar is something one cannot know unless you’ve had one. No one can smoke a cigar for you.”

Which brings up a good point, as both cigar smoking and the shooting sports are under constant attack by those who don’t do—or want to even know about—either. Professing freedom, they then pass (or try to pass) laws prohibiting others from choosing to enjoy these two centuries-old legal pastimes.

“You don’t ‘need’ to own a gun, says Keefe. “It’s your right. Choose to or not, it changes nothing. Freedom was bestowed by the creator. Not man. As for cigars, it’s a personal decision, too. Of course, there are health risks that need to be weighed. Such is the nature of personal responsibility. Just don’t take my last Ashton 898!”

Whether it’s around the campfire after a day’s hunt, or after a shooting session at the range, when the gear is stowed, the stogies come out, almost like an unspoken ritual among cigar smokers. I should know, because not only do I smoke cigars and shoot, I have professionally written about cigars and firearms in magazines and books all my adult life, which includes writing for American Rifleman since 1979 (as well as American Hunter and Shooting Illustrated since then) in addition to having penned many articles about cigar smoking in numerous lifestyle magazines, including Playboy and Robb Report.

Along the way I also authored a number of books, including “50 Famous Firearms You’ve Got to Own” in addition to another titled “The Ultimate Cigar Book,” now in its fourth updated edition. I also write about whiskies and wines (all of which I guess qualifies me as the Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms poster boy), which is why I can relate to NRA Museum Director Philip Schreier, who prefers the Dominican Romeo y Julieta and H. Upmann brands, when he said, “Like fine wine, I love the taste of a good cigar. They also give me something to do, a regulated pattern, something subliminal that is routine.”

And hardly surprising, Shooting Illustrated Editor-In-Chief Ed Friedman is an avid cigar connoisseur, which in turn, led him to assigning me this article. Also, I know for a fact that Mike Harvey who is the head honcho of Cimarron Firearms, is a cigar smoker, as are a few folks at other firearm manufacturers, such as Colt and Ruger.

But, it’s not just us gun guys who smoke cigars. Very often, the cigar makers themselves enjoy the shooting sports, hunting and guns in general, as evidenced by the Dominican Republic’s La Aurora’s line of Cazadores cigars, which is Spanish for “hunters,” and is blended, according to the company, “… for outdoor adventure.” Along those same lines, well-known cigar impresario Rocky Patel—the man responsible for many brands including Decade, the Sixty and the A.L.R. (Aged Limited Edition, Rare)—is quite a waterfowl hunter as well as a sporting-clays enthusiast.

“Cigar smoking and shooting are both outdoor pursuits, so they naturally go great together,” says Patel. “I like to smoke a cigar while duck hunting. As you know, it’s pretty cold in the early morning, and sometimes you’re sitting in a duck blind for an hour and a half, and it’s a great time to relax with a cigar. Other times, some of us will go to a great indoor range or shoot sporting clays together. But once the guns are put away, we get together and smoke a few cigars and discuss how well we did or didn’t do that day. It’s a great boost for camaraderie.” 

Indeed, it’s always a pleasant surprise to be talking with a fellow NRA member and to discover they also share your affinity for cigars (or vice versa). At one of the Premium Cigar Association trade shows (an annual industry-only event, like SHOT Show, but for cigar manufacturers and tobacconists), I was speaking to Nestor Miranda, CEO of Miami Cigar Company about its brands, which include Don Lino, the Nestor Miranda Special Selection and NM80, released in 2023 to celebrate Miranda’s 80th birthday. As he scrolled through photos on his smartphone to show me his newest offerings, he happened to come across a photo of a grizzly, which he then told me he had taken in Canada with his Blaser R8 in .338 Win. Mag. Needless to say, the topic of our conversation quickly switched from cigars to guns and Nestor’s numerous hunting exploits over the years throughout Africa, British Colombia and the U.S.

Another cigar maker who is also a fervent shooter and hunter is Zaya Younan, chairman and CEO of Younan Company, a highly successful global private equity firm that branched into cigar making with its El Septimo brand in 2019 due to Younan’s passion for cigars. It was only when I once described El Septimo’s full-bodied King Sargon Maduro Churchill as a “magnum” smoke that Younan contacted me with an invitation to go shooting at the local range. I have since learned that he also owns a hunting lodge, Chateau de Beauvois, in France.

“I love shooting as a sport, and hunting,” says Younan, who also noted that for more than a decade his company has donated to and supported law enforcement and military personnel and their families. “I have been hunting for over 36 years, and I cannot hunt if I am not smoking a cigar, he says candidly. “Depending on what I hunt, I use different rifles. I have hunted in Tanzania, Namibia, France and Austria,” he says.

Interestingly, the relationship between guns and cigars also extends to many developing countries—primarily Cuba, Nicaragua, Honduras and the Dominican Republic—all of which, paradoxically, make the world’s most coveted hand-rolled cigars. In fact, when I first visited these countries in my research for “The Ultimate Cigar Book,” armed guards were de rigueur in many of the cigar-making factories due to lawlessness and civil unrest at the time, although these guards are not as prevalent today. However, in the early 1990s, during one of my visits to the Arturo Fuente factory located in Santiago, Dominican Republic, I spotted a guard sporting a vintage M1911A1. Upon expressing my interest in his sidearm, my friend and host, Carlos “Carlito” Fuente, Jr, said, “Would you like to see it?” at which point the guard dutifully unholstered his handgun and handed it to me. I could tell by the heft it contained a fully loaded magazine, and with the hammer down, obviously cocked-and-locked was not a dictum here. The pistol itself was a well-worn Remington Rand that had seen a great deal of use, but whether that was on the battlefields or in the tobacco fields no one would say.

Furthermore, on another occasion, while visiting Nestor Plasencia in Estelí, Nicaragua, at his picturesque cigar factory known as “The Cathedral,” I saw a guard patrolling the grounds with a pistol-gripped, pump-action 12-gauge shotgun slung over his shoulder. He proudly swung it around to port arms so I could take his photo.

Before the internet and cell phones, it wasn’t easy writing one of the first cigar books in “modern” times. But, that was four updated editions ago. Today, my book is thicker, cigar brands—like firearms—are more prolific and it is much safer and more relaxing to squeeze off well-aimed shots at the range or in the field and afterward, to fire up a premium stogie and relish in the thick, flavorful memory-laden smoke as it drifts upward. To be sure, the combined pleasures of guns and cigars remain one of the many freedoms that we as Americans enjoy and is among our many cherished freedoms that no one must ever be allowed to take away from us.