Located in the renowned Vuelta Abajo tobacco region in Cuba’s western Pinar del Río province, El Corojo was not only a farm, but the birthplace of Corojo tobacco, a genetic strain developed in the 1930s and ’40s by Daniel’s father, Diego Rodriguez. By careful selection and coddling, Rodriguez chose the very best of each crop, ending up with El Corojo, considered by many connoisseurs to be the finest tobacco ever grown in Cuba. “El Corojo is a legend,” said Adelaida Perez Fuentes, a granddaughter of Diego Rodriguez, in the Summer 1995 Cigar Aficionado story on El Corojo. “My grandfather and uncle created a genetically distinct plant. It was a different color, a different texture and a different size. They took the seeds from that and continued to develop it.”

The El Corojo plantation’s roots date back to 1920, when Diego Rodriguez rented the tract from the Allones family. The Rodriguez’s never owned the original piece of land, but expanded it by purchasing neighboring properties sharing the same soil and microclimate, and by the late 1950s the farm totaled nearly 400 acres. After Diego Rodriguez died in 1956, Daniel carried on his tradition of treating the workers well, even paying them to finish the harvest before he fled Cuba in early 1960 Fidel Castro’s rise to power. Workers living near El Corojo had fond memories of both men when interviewed in the mid-1990s. “Daniel and Diego were real gentlemen,” said Jesus Rodriguez, a distant relative who spent his life working at El Corojo. “They were devoted to this property and also to the workers.”

After leaving Cuba, Rodriguez and his brother Diego grew candela tobacco, first in Quincy, Florida, and then in nearby Havana, Florida. In 1968, Daniel Rodriguez was approached by Anastasio Somoza Debayle, then the president of Nicaragua, to bring his farming talents to Central America. His brother stayed in Florida, while Daniel went to Jalapa with his family, where he grew vast tracts of Cuban-style tobacco on several farms and was an essential part of Joya de Nicaragua, the country’s namesake cigar brand.

“During the Sandinistas, he developed the biggest tobacco operation in Central America,” said Julio Eiroa, the longtime cigar tobacco grower from Honduras and the former owner of Camacho Cigars. “He was a hard worker, a good friend and a good father. We were like brothers—he was one of my best friends.”

Just as his father lost the Corojo plantation to the Cuban revolution, Daniel Rodriguez left the tobacco business during the Nicaraguan war between the Sandinistas and Somoza’s forces, which led to battles in his tobacco fields and the burning of the Joya de Nicaragua factory. “My father left the business because of the revolution,” said Daniel Rodriguez Jr. “He got involved in cattle ranching in Florida.”

Cuba stopped growing Corojo wrapper in the late 1990s, opting for hybrids with more resistance to disease. The Rodriguez family once held the trademark on Corojo, but it expired and the family didn’t renew it, said Rodriguez Jr., and now it’s a term that many cigar companies use.

Daniel Rodriguez’s daughter Rossana and his son-in-law Henry Vilar, still work in the cigar business with a location in Miami.

Reference: James Suckling, David Savona Posted on April 27, 2009. This article can be found in the News & Features section of Cigar Aficionado,
http://www.cigaraficionado.com/webfeatures/show/id/3487

Home to the top brands in the world. We carry Padron Anniversay, Arturo Fuentes, My Father, Oliva, and Vilar, just to name a few.

Family Owned and operated since 1995. Henry Vilar married Rossana Rodriquez Vilar daughter of Daniel Rodriguez. Daniel Rodriquez owned “El Corojo” farm
in Pinar del Rio, Cuba. The Family’s long history made Henry want to keep the tradition alive. So Henry and Rossana opened their first store in South Miami during
the cigar boom of the mid-90’s. Today the Rodriguez Vilar Family owns two retail stores. One in South Miami and Pinecrest Florida.

Best Cigar Shop Miami 2012 – Vilar Cigar Shop

Want to find the real Miami? Stop in Vilar Cigar Shop on a Friday or Saturday night, buy yourself a Maximus Double Corona — you might spend $17.50 on the stogy, but honestly, the extravagance is kind of the point — and walk upstairs to the lounge with supple leather armchairs. The place will be crowded with successful men of all ilk — doctors, lawyers, entrepreneurs — shrouded in fragrant tobacco clouds and animatedly arguing in English, Spanish, and glorious Spanglish. The owner is Henry Vilar, who is also a baseball agent specializing in representing players from Cuba and the rest of Latin America. Shoot the shit, drink beer or rum, slam dominoes, and puff away. This isn’t the kind of scene you can find in Minnesota.