The first commercial crop of tobacco produced in Pitt County occurred during the year 1886. It was during that year that Messrs. L.F. Evans, A.A. Forbes, T.J. Stancille and Jacob Joyner, jointly engaged the service of a Nash County expert. After introducing county farmers to the production of this new crop, the tobacco history of Pitt County has added many pages. The first crop was only a partial success but resulted in more acreage the following year. In the year 1890, Pitt County had reached a production level of nearly a half million pounds.

In 1891, due largely to the effort of R.J. Cobb, stock subscriptions were offered and taken up thus permitting the erection of Greenville's first tobacco warehouse on the site that is now occupied by Bostic Suggs Furniture Company. The new warehouse was known as "The Greenville" and was operated under the direction of G.F. Evans. The first sale took place on September 23, 1891. Prior to the start of the auction, the warehouse was full to overflowing, however, the entire amount of leaf was only about 26,000 pounds. The Greenville Tobacco Market sold 225,000 pounds of leaf during the first year of operation.

Not soon after the building of more warehouses on the Greenville market, the Greenville Tobacco Board of Trade was formed to govern and promote interest in Greenville as a selling point. All warehouse operators, as well as buyers are members of the Tobacco Board of Trade, and adhere to the policies of the Board.

Pitt County is the largest flue-cured tobacco producing county in the Unites States producing 9,548 acres in 2000.

This page (http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/pitt/ag/tobacco/greenvillemarket.html) was created by Mitch Smith on May 18, 2001 and updated on May 18, 2001.