We Kick Off Hemp History Month With a List of Things Learned by Reading a Bunch of Vintage Drug Magazines

• Given their elevation and climate, which mirror the “Golden Triangle” of Southeast Asia, Eastern Oregon and Washington are totally suitable places to grow heroin poppies. 1
• In India, there are people who make charas, or hash resin, by hand-rubbing the mature plants to collect grams of goop without cutting the plant down. These people consider the idea of chopping plants down to get resin ridiculous, “like killing a valuable cow for an udder’s worth of milk.” 2
• Sinsemilla Tips, the journal of professional marijuana growers, was published in Corvallis. This highly technical magazine cost the equivalent of $14 in today’s money. 3
• Professional douchebag Geraldo Rivera set up the publisher of Sinsemilla Tips for a hostile interview in which he asked how much of the weed was sold to kids. As it turned out, the cops who “busted” the publisher’s farm were later arrested for selling weed from the bust. 4
• A decade after Oregon decriminalized pot, disgraced former Democratic governor Neil Goldschmidt (later revealed to be a pedophile) supported recriminalizing marijuana in Oregon because he was worried he’d lose the election to prohibitionist Republican Dave Frohnmayer (later president of the University of Oregon). 5
• When Ken Kesey decided to hop off the Furthur bus and stay home instead of going to Woodstock, he planted a sign in the driveway to his family dairy farm that said, simply, “No!” 6
• Hawaiian cannabis was the gold standard in the 1980s, and the reason it was so sought-after was its super-sativa hybrids, which were created with high-quality Asian genetics carried back by Vietnam veterans returning from the war. 7
• The Matsés people of the Amazon get high using a drug called nu-nu, made with rustic tobacco that’s mixed with the ashes of mocambo bark. They ingest it by having someone blow it through a bamboo tube into their noses. 8
• In Morocco, Majoun is a candied marijuana that’s commonly served as an edible to the whole family at local festivals. 9

1 "On the Opium Trail,"
Head Monthly, May 1978

2 "Home of the Gods,"
High Times, January 1987

3 "Reader's Rights,"
Sinsemilla Tips, Volume 8 No. 4

4 "Publisher's Page,"
Sinsemilla Tips, Volume 8 No. 4

5 "Potline,"
Sinsemilla Tips, Volume 8 No. 4

6 "The Reluctant Guru,"
High Times, December 1986

7 "Aloha!!!"
High Times, January 1987

8 "The Dream of Hunters,"
High Times, December 1986

9 "The Kif-Smoker in Morocco,"
Head Monthly, May 1978