RoMa Craft Tobac is taking a trick it has used on CroMagnon and applying it to Intemperance. The new cigar is called Intemperance WR 1794 Monongahela, and it is a barber-pole version of the Whiskey Rebellion line — at least for now, only if you find it at an event.
halfwheel reports that co-founder Skip Martin has been showing the cigar, a 5 x 56 parejo, the same vitola as regular-production WR 1794 Bradford. The change is on the outside. The standard Ecuadorian habano ligero wrapper is joined by an Ecuadorian Connecticut-seed leaf, twisted into the two-tone wrap that cigar fans call a barber pole.
Michael Rosales, RoMa Craft’s other co-founder, told halfwheel that Monongahela will be an event-only cigar at first, and probably quite limited. He also said he has not yet determined which event will be the first to offer it, and that wider distribution is possible later. There is no published price, no street date, and no named debut event in the coverage we reviewed.
That last point matters for anyone hoping to catch one. Until RoMa Craft names a stop, there is no specific listing to put on the calendar. When a debut event is announced, it belongs on TheCigarEvents.com, the free national premium cigar event calendar we wrote about earlier this week. We will update this story with that listing once it is live.
A Familiar Size, a Different Wrapper
halfwheel lists Monongahela as being made at Fábrica de Tabacos NicaSueño S.A. in Nicaragua, with an Ecuadorian habano ligero and Ecuadorian Connecticut-seed wrapper, an Indonesian Besuki binder, and fillers from the Dominican Republic and Nicaragua.
That tracks with the rest of the WR 1794 line. On RoMa Craft’s WR 1794 page, the regular blend is described as a dark Ecuador habano hybrid wrapper, an Indonesian Besuki binder, and a filler that includes a criollo Jalapa base, a corojo viso from Jalapa, and ligeros from Estelí and the Dominican Republic (Peñuela). The Bradford, the 5 x 56 that Monongahela shares a size with, is the vitola named for David Bradford, a leader of the Whiskey Rebellion.
We are treating the barber-pole wrapper as the confirmed change for Monongahela, and the halfwheel blend notes as the specs for this cigar. We are not assuming every internal filler component on the core WR 1794 page automatically carries over, even if the family resemblance is obvious.
RoMa Craft has done this kind of limited barber-pole run before on CroMagnon, most notably CroMagnon Black Irish and Aquitaine EMH Saber Tooth, as halfwheel notes. The difference here is the line. Intemperance is RoMa Craft’s historically themed brand, and WR 1794 is the chapter that looks back to the whiskey tax protests in western Pennsylvania — not a one-off shape experiment.
Both wrapper leaves are Ecuadorian, which is worth a mention this fall. We recently looked at what Ecuador’s wrapper shortage means for the cigars that actually reach smokers. Nothing in the Monongahela coverage says this cigar is delayed or shorted, and a barber pole that uses two Ecuadorian leaves is still just a blend choice until the company says otherwise. It is, however, a reminder that the wrapper is doing a lot of the visual work on this one.
Why It Is Called Monongahela
The name is geography and history, not a flavor descriptor. Monongahela, Pennsylvania, sits about 20 miles south of Pittsburgh and was an important site in the Whiskey Rebellion, the early 1790s uprising against a federal excise tax on distilled spirits.
halfwheel notes that on Aug. 14, 1794, more than 200 rebels met on the banks of the Monongahela River in what is now Monongahela, Pa. RoMa Craft’s own WR 1794 copy frames the line as a tribute to the farmers and distillers who pushed back against that tax. A barber-pole exclusive named for that meeting place fits the brand’s habit of naming vitolas after people and places from the rebellion.
halfwheel even floated the idea that a southwestern Pennsylvania event would be a fitting debut. That is a nice thought, and it is still just a thought. Rosales has not named a first event, in Pennsylvania or anywhere else, so we are not going to preview one.
Intemperance WR 1794 Monongahela at a Glance
- Maker: RoMa Craft Tobac
- Line: Intemperance WR 1794
- Vitola: 5 x 56 parejo (same size as WR 1794 Bradford)
- Wrapper: Ecuadorian habano ligero and Ecuadorian Connecticut-seed (barber pole)
- Binder: Indonesia (Besuki)
- Filler: Dominican Republic and Nicaragua
- Factory: Fábrica de Tabacos NicaSueño S.A., Nicaragua
- Release type: Event-only, at least initially
- Price: Not published
- Debut event: Not yet named
- Status: Shown by Skip Martin; first event still to be determined, per Michael Rosales in halfwheel’s Nov. 10, 2026 report
The Cigar Guys’ Take
Event-only cigars are a double-edged thing. They give a shop night or a festival a cigar you cannot buy the following Tuesday, and they also mean most people will hear about Monongahela long before they ever see one. Until RoMa Craft names a stop, the only honest advice is to watch the Intemperance event calendar — and TheCigarEvents.com — rather than refreshing a product page.
If you already like WR 1794 Bradford, this is the same size with a two-tone Ecuadorian wrapper and a story that stays inside the Whiskey Rebellion theme. That is a better reason to stand in line than rarity alone. We have not smoked it, and we will not pretend a barber pole automatically smokes differently just because it photographs well.
When the first event is announced, ask the host shop whether Monongahela is actually on the table, because “select events” is still a short list with no names on it. For more on the core blend, start with RoMa Craft’s WR 1794 page. If you are tracking the rest of this year’s launches, our guide to new cigars releasing in 2026 is a useful running list.
Keep it locked to The Cigar Guys Podcast for more cigar news every week.
*Sources: halfwheel: Intemperance WR 1794 Monongahela Coming to Select Events (Nov. 10, 2026) · RoMa Craft Tobac: WR 1794*
