<p class="title">A signed wooden box, containing a set of 24 cigars from the personal collection of Cuban revolutionary Fidel Castro, is expected to fetch USD 20,000 at an auction in the US.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The Trinidad Fundadores cigar box retains its "Republica de Cuba" cigar warranty seal, which has been re-adhered to the cover.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The box contains 24 cigars, and is stamped on each end, "24 Fundadores," with a maker's mark on the bottom, "Habanos S A, Hecho en Cuba, Totalmente a mano."</p>.<p class="bodytext">The box is accompanied by an image of Castro signing it for noted philanthropist Eva Haller, according to the Boston-based RR Auctions.</p>.<p class="bodytext">"Castro handed to me the box of cigars. He gave them to me because I jokingly asked him for it when others lit a cigar," Haller wrote in a letter dated March 2002.</p>.<p class="bodytext">"I told him, that if he signs the box, I will sell it and make lots of money. He thought that was funny," she wrote.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Beginning in 1980, Trinidad Fundadores were exclusively produced for Fidel Castro, and until 1998 the only boxes that were allowed to leave Cuba had been gifts to foreign dignitaries.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The brand made its official launch as a Cuban export in February 1998, and this box - from Castro's personal stash - was signed and given away only four years later.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Cigars were an integral component of Castro's heroic revolutionary image, and as such, this signed box is a truly remarkable historical artifact, according to the RR Auctions.</p>
<p class="title">A signed wooden box, containing a set of 24 cigars from the personal collection of Cuban revolutionary Fidel Castro, is expected to fetch USD 20,000 at an auction in the US.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The Trinidad Fundadores cigar box retains its "Republica de Cuba" cigar warranty seal, which has been re-adhered to the cover.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The box contains 24 cigars, and is stamped on each end, "24 Fundadores," with a maker's mark on the bottom, "Habanos S A, Hecho en Cuba, Totalmente a mano."</p>.<p class="bodytext">The box is accompanied by an image of Castro signing it for noted philanthropist Eva Haller, according to the Boston-based RR Auctions.</p>.<p class="bodytext">"Castro handed to me the box of cigars. He gave them to me because I jokingly asked him for it when others lit a cigar," Haller wrote in a letter dated March 2002.</p>.<p class="bodytext">"I told him, that if he signs the box, I will sell it and make lots of money. He thought that was funny," she wrote.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Beginning in 1980, Trinidad Fundadores were exclusively produced for Fidel Castro, and until 1998 the only boxes that were allowed to leave Cuba had been gifts to foreign dignitaries.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The brand made its official launch as a Cuban export in February 1998, and this box - from Castro's personal stash - was signed and given away only four years later.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Cigars were an integral component of Castro's heroic revolutionary image, and as such, this signed box is a truly remarkable historical artifact, according to the RR Auctions.</p>