June 15, 2010
Cigar Begone
A Tale of Boneheaded Political Correctness
A London museum today acknowledged that a photograph of Winston Churchill hanging over the museum entrance had been digitally altered to erase the cigar from Churchill's mouth. As first reported in the Telegraph, the Winston Churchill's Britain at War Experience museum "declined to reveal who was responsible...for this alteration." The museum did promise to restore Churchill's politcally incorrect signature stub at once.
We have in our inventory one of Churchill's original cigar bands. It comes with the secretarial presentation letter that first accompanied it, authenticating the band as having been "taken from one of the cigars he smoked himself.” No airbrush can ever wipe it away.