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Tampa Bay's Cigar City Magazine
The Jan./Feb. issue is now available. Purchase one before they run out. Inside this issue read:

6 Feet of Fame By Paul Guzzo
One of the bar's owners, the 37-year-old Bobby Rodriguez, boasting slicked back hair, dusty jeans, sunglasses despite the late hour of the night, a taut black T-shirt, and swollen hands from years of crushing skulls - a cross between Al Davis and Johnny Cash – strolls through the bar and smiles at the carnage. A messy bar means a successful bar, and his bar has never enjoyed so much success. Business has doubled ever since his partner Pat Matassini hired some brash 32-year-old named Joe Redner to manage the bar eight months ago. Redner thought big. He came to the bar and saw that it was doing decent business with one stage and one go-go dancer performing at a time and decided that he would build two more stages so that three girls could dance at a time. His plan immediately saw dividends. More and more men flocked to the bar and it became one of Tampa’s hottest night spots.

Tampa’s African American Baseball Teams By Rodney Kite-Powell
While most people recognize the names Tampa Smokers, Tampa Tarpons, and of course, Tampa Bay Rays, few can recall the names of Tampa's professional and semi-professional African American teams. Those teams, including the Tampa Colored Giants, the Tampa Black Smokers, the Pepsi Cola Giants, and the Tampa Rockets, were vital to the area's black population because they provided an outlet that did not exist in the segregated baseball organizations of the first half of the 20th century.

Like the Tampa Smokers, these teams served as part of a de facto minor league system that fed talent to the African American big league teams. Many of Tampa's black baseball players made the best of their opportunity, with some, such as Raydell "Lefty Bo" Maddix,
Clifford "Quack" Brown, Bob "Peach Head" Mitchell, and Walter "Dirk" Gibbons, moving from the local teams to the Negro Baseball League.

An Ybor City Love Affair to Be Remembered By Sylvia Cantrell Albritton, Ed.D.
When I think of a beautiful love affair between a man and a woman, I think of my aunt and uncle's love story. What makes this couple so special or so different from anyone else? The answer to this question is not an easy one because it is never just one thing that sets it apart from the rest, but rather a combination of giving more than taking, considering each day a blessing, and greeting each day with a positive attitude.

My aunt and uncle were the most dedicated individuals to one another that I have ever met. He called her Mimi and she called him Pe, and they existed in a simple and pure life in the heart of Ybor City. These two were inseparable except for daytime working hours. She lovingly fixed and packed his lunch each morning, and delighted in preparing a huge meal when he returned in the evening just for him. In his eyes, his wife was the most beautiful woman in the world, and to her, he was certainly her Prince Charming.

Café con Leche Interview By Paul Guzzo
As he performs his art, as he paints pictures with his words, the room of one-time naysayers can't take their eyes or ears off him. He is not a corporate poet. He is a poet's poet- through and through. He was born a poet. He has lived a poet's life. And he will one day die a poet. He is James Tokley, one of Tampa's greatest writers.

Pick up your copy of Cigar City Magazine at:
• Barnes & Noble (South Tampa location)
• Additional locations throughout the Tampa Bay area