Now in Brooklyn, Homegrown Tobacco: Local, Rebellious and Tax Free
Chang W. Lee/The New York Times





Audrey Silk, with Bingo, estimates she will save thousands of dollars by processing her own cigarettes.
By MANNY FERNANDEZ
Published: February 24, 2011

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The cigarettes Audrey Silk used to smoke — Parliament Lights — are made at a factory in Richmond, Va. The cigarettes she smokes these days are made and grown in Brooklyn, at her house.
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Chang W. Lee/The New York Times

Ms. Silk, a retired police officer and the founder of a smokers’ rights group, grows her own tobacco and dries the leaves in her basement.
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Chang W. Lee/The New York Times

Leftover tobacco leaves in Audrey Silk’s backyard. Ms. Silk says the leaves look “like elephant earsâ€