The Duke homestead, where Washington Duke opened his first tobacco factory in a rickety one-room barn, is today a National Historic Landmark. As a Confederate soldier, Duke learned about the Union soldiers' love of bright-leaf tobacco, and he returned home to begin the humble enterprise that would one day establish North Carolina as the heart of a worldwide tobacco empire. The homestead has been called a "living museum of tobacco history," and the early farming techniques and manufacturing processes used in the production of tobacco are demonstrated. (Don't mention cancer around here.) A color film, Carolina Bright, serves as an orientation to the site.