Reefer Madness – 1895 to the Present – Chapter 4: 1910 to 1920 – Loco Weed
In this chapter, DML provides many examples of the 3 conceptual devices used by prohibitionists in the second decade of the 20th century to set the stage for cannabis prohibition: ignorance about the effects of cannabis, parental hysteria, and racism, along with twin structural devices: shutting down schools of herbalism, and setting up international drug prohibition treaties.
DML also provides some examples of the hemp being grown, a few examples of the legal pharmaceutical cannabis products available – and some photos of hashish and marijuana smokers in their natural habitat – as a stark contrast to the anti-pot stigma campaign during this time period.
Special thanks to the Cannabis Museum for sponsoring the creation of this series. The introduction to this series (Reefer Madness – 1895 to the Present) can be found here. Chapter 1 can be found here. Chapter 2 can be found here. Chapter 3 can be found here.
“Traditional herbalism has been regarded as a method of alternative medicine in the United States since the Flexner Report of 1910 led to the closing of the eclectic medical schools where botanical medicine was exclusively practiced.”
– “History of Herbalism,” Wikipedia (1)
“Flexner clearly doubted the scientific validity of all forms of medicine other than that based on scientific research, deeming any approach to medicine that did not advocate the use of treatments such as vaccines to prevent and cure illness as tantamount to quackery and charlatanism.”
– “Flexner Report,” Wikipedia (2)
“Civilization, in fact, grows more and more maudlin and hysterical; especially under democracy it tends to degenerate into a mere combat of crazes; the whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by an endless series of hobgoblins, most of them imaginary.”
– H.L. Mencken, In Defense Of Women, 1918 (3)
The Flexner Report of 1910 – a product of the Carnegie (and, in reality, Rockefeller) Foundation – reported on medical schools, effectively preventing botanical medical schools from getting any financial support. This was one of the ways big business shaped the practice of medicine in a manner that benefitted them economically. (4) Representative democracy – and the various institutions that operated within it – was (as usual) easily manipulated by the wealthy.
The destruction of the herbal schools was not only a boon for proprietary synthetic medicine, it also harmed a public that had benefitted from easy access to herbal medicines for over 60 years – including cannabis, coca and opium medicines. Broad sections of the general public used these medicines with very little in the way of problematic use, especially when compared with today’s opioid and methamphetamine-related problems, which arguably were the result of the anti-cannabis, anti-opium/heroin and anti-coca/cocaine laws. (5)
By 1932, Arthur Dean Bevan, the head of the American Medical Association’s committees on medical education, stated he was “grateful” to Flexner for enabling them “to put out of business” the eclectic medical schools in existence in 1910. (6)
Image #1: Abraham Flexner, author of the Flexner Report of 1910, circa 1910 https://pathology.medicine.uiowa.edu/about/departmental-history/flexner-report
In spite of this era being a cutting-edge time in the history of cannabis medicine – cannabis medicines were being “standardized” by multiple drug companies, including Park, Davis & Co, who began promoting its new “Cannabis Americana” cultivar to doctors (7) – this decade was also the era that herbal medicine was de-funded by those heavily invested in allopathic medicine. (8) This pressure from the ever-expanding pharmaceutical industry affected the public discussion surrounding drug prohibition in a big way. But there was another conflict of interest at work, from yet another group of powerful men.
The other major conflict of interest that shaped the drug economy was the initiation of global drug prohibition by members of the US elite – especially the politicians and lawyers that came from the Skull & Bones fraternity at Yale. Society suffered from this conflict of interest; these elites – through their positions in politics, business and academia – were entrusted with the public’s health and safety, and yet they were economically interested in making money in the black market in illegal drugs, just as the founders of Skull & Bones benefitted heavily from opium money when opium was first prohibited in China in the mid 1800s. (9)
Skull & Bones members William Taft, Francis Harrison and Henry Stimson – along with lawyer/politician Elihu Root (who represented Bones member W. C. Whitney and was represented by Bones member Henry Stimson) – were instrumental in setting up modern-day international drug prohibition. This process began with Taft and Root’s experiments with drug prohibition in the Philippines, where Taft served as the first US Governor General there. Harrison and Stimson also assumed the role as Governor-General of the Philippines in many of the years following, monitoring the model of drug prohibition they had created and then imported into to the US (Francis Harrison was also responsible for the Harrison Narcotic Act of 1914) and then foisted upon the rest of the world. Once drug prohibition was in motion in the Philippines, Root began creating similar laws against opium in the United States. Taft and Root would then initiate the Shanghi Conference of 1909 – the first of many international meetings on global drug prohibition coordination amongst nations, with the goal of setting up an international drug treaty prohibition system, which focused mainly on prohibiting (or monopolizing) opium, coca and cannabis. (10) Members of the Skull & Bones fraternity would go on to be responsible for creating the CIA, which by 1967 became the biggest illegal drug smuggling organization on earth, taking advantage of the drug prohibition created by their frat brothers of yesteryear. William Henry Welch, who helped initiate the creation of the Flexner report, and then put its recommendations into practice, was also a member of Skull & Bones. (11)
Image #2: Simon Flexner, William H. Welch, and John D. Rockefeller Jr., THE FABULOUS FLEXNERS AND THE EXTRAORDINARY DR. WELCH, Rockefeller University, 2013
A year after the Shanghai Conference – which focused on opium – some newspapers were still reporting that “hasheesh” wasn’t all that bad. In an article titled “ASIATICS DENIED LIQUOR FIND SOLICE IN HASHEESH” – originally found in Harper’s Weekly – a journalist noted;
“With many classes this moderate indulgence, which never seems to attain any more violent stage, does not appear to interfere with the performance or duty or lessen the powers of endurance. Persian charvadars (a person who drives mules) or caravan drivers, or porters, will do a fabulous day’s work, looking all the time ready to drop of fatigue.” (12)
Image #3: “ASIATICS DENIED LIQUOR FIND SOLACE IN HASHEESH,” The York Daily, York, Pennsylvania, February 18th 1910, p. 4
Meanwhile, the (predominantly white-owned) industrial hemp economy and the (predominantly white-owned) pharmaceutical cannabis economy persisted everywhere. The participants of these legitimate economies were completely oblivious to the seemingly unrelated stigmatization campaign against the use of home-grown cannabis by non-whites, happening simultaneous to their relatively problem-free day-to-day existence.
Image #4: “Hemp-Breaking Machine, Invented By Bourbon County Boy, Solves Labor Problem,” The Courier-Journal, Louisville, Kentucky, June 19th 1910, p. 17
Image #5: “Hemp-Breaking Machine, Invented By Bourbon County Boy, Solves Labor Problem,” The Courier-Journal, Louisville, Kentucky, June 19th 1910, p. 17
Image #6: “PIONEER HANDICRAFT,” The Kansas City Star, Kansas City, Missouri, October 1st 1911, p. 33
Image #7: “A man gathers long stalks of hemp into a bundle, the hemp was used to produce binder twine. Wisconsin 1912” www.thecannachronicles.com/wisconsin-hemp-harvest-1912/
Image #8: PLANTS OF GREAT COMMERCIAL VALUE, Copyright, 1912, By F. E. Wright https://hempology.org/PRINTS.HTML/1912.html
Image #9: PISO’S ad, Beaver County Republican, Ecter, Oklahoma, March 29th, 1912, p. 3
In 1912, a second international conference arose as a result of the first. This one was held in The Hague, Netherlands. “Indian Hemp” was first mentioned here:
“The Conference is of the opinion that it is advisable to study the question of Indian Hemp from the statistical and scientific standpoint, with a view to regulating its misuse, should the necessity therefor make itself felt, by domestic legislation or by an international agreement.” (13)
Time would tell that these people had no intention of “regulating its misuse” – they wanted to “prohibit its use” entirely.
In November of 1912, an article on Victor Robinson’s book An Essay On Hasheesh appeared in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle. The author’s brother took an oral dose and proceeded to share insights into woman’s suffrage movement (which would manifest into women’s right to vote just 8 years later) and Marxism in Russia (which would manifest into the Soviet Union just 5 years later) in between partaking in “the hasheesh-laugh.” (14)
Image #10: “Young Author Writes Weird Hasheesh Essay,” The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, Brooklyn, New York, November 17th, 1912, p. 43
Image #11: “Young Author Writes Weird Hasheesh Essay,” The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, Brooklyn, New York, November 17th, 1912, p. 43
These insights mirror similar effects observed by this author – when the effects of cannabis are observed in their natural surroundings and appraised honestly, socio-political insights and laughter are two of the most common occurrences. I have never observed delirium in myself or others – violent or otherwise – in spite of partaking in literally tens of thousands of smoking sessions.
Less than two months later, an El Paso newspaper page one headline exclaimed:
“CRAZED BY A WEED, MAN MURDERS . . . HAD SMOKED A MEXICAN ‘DOPE’”
The story began and ended with the reefer madness myth;
“Marihuana, that native Mexican herb which causes the smoker to crave murder, is held accountable for two deaths and a bloody affray on the streets of Juarez Wednesday afternoon. Crazed by continual use of the drug, an unidentified Mexican, killed a policeman, wounded another, stabbed two horses and pursued an El Paso woman and her escort, brandishing a huge knife in the air. . . . persons who had seen him said that the man unmistakably had been smoking the native opium, ‘marihuana’. . . . ‘Marihuana’ has a more dreadful effect than opium, creating in its victims hallucinations which frequently result in violent crimes.” (15)
Image #12: ”CRAZED BY A WEED, MAN MURDERS,” El Paso Herald, El Paso, Texas, January 2nd, 2013, p. 1
Image #13: The Sacramento Star, Sacramento, California, September 6th, 1909, p. 8
Image #14: “Ramie and Hemp Industry at Lerdo, Kern County is Thriving,” Bakersfield Morning Echo, Bakersfield, California, June 22nd, 1913, p. 18
Image #15: Package Label from Eli Lilly, marked October 11, 1913 https://www.atrainceu.com/content/4-cannabis-medication
A year later, that same newspaper – the El Paso Herald – announced that
“Crazed by marihuana, it is claimed, John Doe, a Mexican, ran through the glass front doors of the stores in the 700 block on South El Paso street Wednesday afternoon. Then for three blocks he outran the horses of mounted policemen Tom York and Dan Thompson, who were sent to capture him. . . . A quantity of marihuana was taken from him at the station.” (16)
Image #16: a 1914 US $10 dollar bill.
Image #17: detail, hemp harvester, on the 1914 US $10 dollar bill.
Image #18: a similar harvester, from Project Gutenberg’s USDA Farmers’ Bulletin No. 1935: Hemp, by B. B. Robinson https://www.gutenberg.org/files/59625/59625-h/59625-h.htm
Image #19: Ad, The Boston Globe, March 22nd, 1914, p. 63
A little less than five months later, that same newspaper – the El Paso Herald – published another story with terrifying headlines:
“Poisonous Weeds Of Mexico Cause Death – Violent Insanity Follows Use of Marihuana; Other Weeds Cause Victim to Run Until Death Follows”.
Under the heading “Effects of Marihuana”, it was written that;
“It is said that immediately after the first three or four draughts smokers begin to feel a slight headache. Then they see everything moving around, and finally they lose all control of their mental faculties. They imagine they see herds of tigers, lions and devils coming to attack them. They are not afraid at all of these, but feel themselves brave and strong enough to fight and annihilate their enemies. But there are imaginary beings whom the wildman cannot kill, and these are what begin to inspire fear, until the smoker is panic stricken and starts to run. Not very long ago a Mexican in Veracruz who had smoked a marihuana cigaret attacked and killed a policeman and badly wounded three others. Six policemen were needed to disarm him and take him to the police station, where he had to be put into a straight jacket. Such occurrences are frequent. . . . People who become addicted to smoking marihuana finally lose their minds and never recover.” (17)
The last part of this story was attached – word for word – to a different story about a travelling salesman and his observations of the Mexican Army, four months later in a newspaper in Ohio. (18)
Image #20: “MEXICAN SOCIDERS WARNED OF DANGER FROM SEDUCTIVE WEED WHOSE USE CAUSES INSANITY,” The Evening Review, East Liverpool, Ohio, September 18th, 1914, p. 12
Similar stories appear in newspapers all over the United States. “Marijuana Weed Will Cause Insanity” roared the page 6 headline of an article in the Roosevelt, Utah newspaper The Roosevelt Standard, assuring readers that
“When much indulged in, smoking of the dry leaves of the plant causes insanity.” (19)
Image #21: “LIFE IN CONSTANTINOPLE”, National Geographic Magazine, December 1914, p. 540
Image #22: “MYSTIC NEDJEF, THE SHIA MECCA”, National Geographic Magazine, December 1914, p. 588
Image #23: “Cannabis garden curated by Italian prisoners of war under the control of the Austro-Hungarian Empire at Ljubljana Castle, Austria (present day Slovenia) during WW1 between 1915-1919” www.thecannachronicles.com/italian-pow-cannabis-garden-1915/
Image #24: “Subtle Hasheesh Is Popular Among Boys,” Press-Telegram, Long Beach, California, March 13th, 1915, p. 1
The word “cannabis” was sometimes used when the dealer in question happened to be a white person. For example, the druggist in Portland Oregon was to be arrested “for the Purpose of Making a Test Case”;
“An arrest will probably be made tomorrow of a druggist, whose name is withheld, that the legality of the sale of Indian Cannabis, or ‘hashish’, to young boys may be tested. Chief Probation Officer McIntosh will ask the city council next Monday to pass an ordinance with an emergency clause attached against the sale of the drug to boys. Ross C. Plummer, a member of the state pharmacy board, said that he would take up with the board the question of ruling on the subject, which, he said, the board is empowered to do. These measures follow the discovery by juvenile court officers that boys can purchase the drug from several stores without question. Boys accompanied by officers went to four drug stores and bought quantities of the drug. Mr. McIntosh said a dozen boys, from 11 to 18 years old, are know to be addicted to its use. The investigation yesterday followed two months of work on the matter by the juvenile court officers. The drug, according to Mr. Plummer, is a substitute for morphine and cocaine.” (20)
Image #25: “Legality of Sale of Cannabis Question,” The Oregon Daily Journal, Portland, Oregon, March 15th, 1915, p. 6
The Harrison Narcotics Act was approved on December 17, 1914, and came into effect the next year. Wikipedia summarizes the initial and eventual consequences of the act accurately:
“‘An Act To provide for the registration of, with collectors of internal revenue, and to impose a special tax on all persons who produce, import, manufacture, compound, deal in, dispense, sell, distribute, or give away opium or coca leaves, their salts, derivatives, or preparations, and for other purposes.’ In Webb v. United States, the act was interpreted to prohibit prescribing maintenance doses for narcotics unless it was intended to cure the patient’s addiction.” (21)
Combined with the 1919 decision in Webb v. United States, the Harrison Narcotics Act was a slow-motion prohibition in the guise of regulation. The effects of this policy were almost immediately visible. On May 15, 1915, just six weeks after the effective date of the Harrison Act, an editorial in the New York Medical Journal declared:
“As was expected … the immediate effects of the Harrison antinarcotic law were seen in the flocking of drug habitues to hospitals and sanatoriums. Sporadic crimes of violence were reported too, due usually to desperate efforts by addicts to obtain drugs, but occasionally to a delirious state induced by sudden withdrawal. . . . The really serious results of this legislation, however, will only appear gradually and will not always be recognized as such. These will be the failures of promising careers, the disrupting of happy families, the commission of crimes which will never be traced to their real cause, and the influx into hospitals to the mentally disordered of many who would otherwise live socially competent lives.” (22)
Modern day “cannabis withdrawal experts” do not report “delirious states” – or anything even close – as a result of cannabis withdrawal. (23) And yet cannabis would be lumped into the same category of – and even called a – “narcotic” – and “regulated” (prohibited) in much the same manner as opium and cocaine in a very short time.
Six months later an editorial in American Medicine reported:
“Narcotic drug addiction is one of the gravest and most important questions confronting the medical profession today. Instead of improving conditions the laws recently passed have made the problem more complex. Honest medical men have found such handicaps and dangers to themselves and their reputations in these laws . . . that they have simply decided to have as little to do as possible with drug addicts or their needs. . . . The druggists are in the same position and for similar reasons many of them have discontinued entirely the sale of narcotic drugs. [The addict] is denied the medical care he urgently needs, open, above-board sources from which he formerly obtained his drug supply are closed to him, and he is driven to the underworld where lie can get his drug, but of course, surreptitiously and in violation of the law… Abuses in the sale of narcotic drugs are increasing. . . . A particular sinister sequence . . . is the character of the places to which [addicts]are forced to go to get their drugs and the type of people with whom they are obliged to mix. The most depraved criminals are often the dispensers of these habit-forming drugs. The moral dangers, as well as the effect on the self-respect of the addict, call for no comment. One has only to think of the stress under which the addict lives, and to recall his lack of funds, to realize the extent to which these . . . afflicted individuals are under the control of the worst elements of society. In respect to female habitues the conditions are worse, if possible. Houses of ill fame are usually their sources of supply, and one has only to think of what repeated visitations to such places mean to countless good women and girls unblemished in most instances except for an unfortunate addiction to some narcotic drug-to appreciate the terrible menace.” (24)
Around this time marihuana-related legislation began to appear. The El Paso Herald announced “NEW ANTI-MARIHUANA ORDINANCE VERY STRINGENT” in its June 7th, 1915 headline. Interestingly, this newspaper covered some resistance from the local medical establishment;
“The anti-marihuana ordinance is designed to become effective June 14. It is stated by local physicians and druggists that marihuana has legitimate uses. It is put up by the foremost drug manufacturers in the country and is frequently prescribed, as it is a sedative of value. While the ordinance is designed to avoid the sale of this drug for smoking purposes, no mention is made in the new law that it may be used legitimately. Nearly all of the drug stores in the city have quantities on hand for use in prescriptions, though they say they never sell it to smokers. The published ordinance will make it a felony for drug stores to have this drug on hand. All are agreed that marihuana is a dangerous drug and that an effort should be made to have Mexico adopt stringent laws relative to its growth and sale in that country, particularly at border points because the stopping of its sale in El Paso will not absolutely do away with the possibility of users of the weed securing it for their purposes.” (25)
On June 3rd, 1915, the city of El Paso, Texas passed the following ordinance, published in the El Paso Herald on June 9th;
“AN ORDINANCE PROHIBITING THE SALE, BARTER, EXCHANGE, GIVING AWAY OR HAVING IN POSSESSION ANY MARIHUANA OR INDIAN HEMP WITHIN THE CORPORATE LIMITS OF THE CITY OF EL PASO, TEXAS, AND PROVIDING A PENALTY FOR THE VIOLATION THEREOF. BE IT ORDAINED BY THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF EL PASO, TEXAS.
SECTION 1. It shall be unlawful for any person, firm, corporation or association of persons to sell, barter, exchange, give away, or have in his or their possession, within the city limits of the city of El Paso, Texas, any marihuana or Indian Hemp.
SECTION 2. Any person who shall violate any of the provisions of Section 1 of this ordinance shall be punished by a fine of not more than Two Hundred ($200) Dollars.
SECTION 3. The dangerous and powerful properties of Marijuana or Indian Hemp and the increasing sale of the same in the City of El Paso with the resulting injury to public health and public morals, creating a great public emergency, justifying the suspension of the charter rule requiring that all ordinances before final adoption shall be read at two regular meetings of the City Council, and said rule is, by unanimous vote of the Aldermen present and with consent of the Mayor, suspended, and this ordinance shall take effect from and after its passage, approval and publication. Passed and approved this, the 3rd day of June, A. D. 1915. – TOM LEA, Mayor. Attest: J. F. DAWSON, City Clerk.” (26)
Image #26: “Ordinance.” El Paso Herald, El Paso, Texas, June 9th, 1915, p. 10
Sometimes it appeared that this anti-marijuana law was just a way to get rid of rowdy Mexicans in towns near the Mexican border. For example, in the Southern California town of Santa Ana, the local paper’s page 3 headline read;
“LOCOED MEXICAN IS CAPTURED BY POLICE IN ORCHARD ON M’CLAY – Smoked Mex Hop and Was Having Perfectly Glorious Time Yesterday . . . Marcus was ‘locoed’ as a result of smoking what is sometimes called ‘Merry Wanna Weed’ or ‘Loco Weed.’ He was charging up and down the rows of trees, yelling and having a perfectly glorious time. Thinking that the neighborhood was in jeopardy, F. C. Rowland, 810 McClay street, thought it wise to notify the police and have Marcus placed in the county jail. Marcus is not smoking his particular brand of poison at the present time.” (27)
On July 28th, 1915, the front page of a Californian newspapers reported on Santa Ana Sheriff Jackson and Deputy District Attorney Koepsel, who were planning to create an “ordinance making it a misdemeanor to have the seed, to grow the stuff or have it in possession either dried or undried, root, branch, leaves, flowers, pods or seed. It is planned to effectively vamoose the marijuana.” When we look for the reasons behind this early example of cannabis prohibition, it is claimed that:
“Marihuana is a Mexican dope weed. Those who know something about the stuff say that a cigarette of dried marihuana leaves puts the smoker over the border of reason into the realm of insane joy or meanness. The trouble with the weed is that it is just as likely to make a murderer out of the smoker as it is to make a dancer. If it only made the partaker therof joyfully flighty and angelically delighted with life, its presence might be forgiven by some people. However, its effect is just as likely to develop into a desire to hear the crack of a pistol and to see red blood flow down some person’s shirt front. The sheriff has received information from a former Mexican officer that seventeen murders were committed in one battalion of the Mexican army as a result of marihuana smoking. This same informant says that ninety per cent of the murders in Mexico can be laid at the foot of the marihuana bush. The thing that has stirred the sheriff is reliable information to the effect that there are a number of marihuana gardens started in this county. Only recently several bushes of the sense-killer were uprooted at the Delhi and carried away by the officers.” (28)
The next month saw the beginning of a major push to blame Marijuana for the ongoing Mexican Revolution, a revolution which began in 1910 and which would last a decade. These news stories would target Pancho Villa, the revolutionary leader of the North of Mexico, a leader who smoked marijuana, and who’s men smoked marijuana and sang about marijuana in a famous song of the day, La Cucaracha. More about this song can be found in Chapter 6.
In a headline which claimed that “CITIES VILLA CONTROLS FILLED WITH VICE DENS – Juarez Gambling Halls and Other Vicious Places Crowded with Dregs of American Slums – All Pay Toll to Villa,” the article states, under the heading “Worst Vice in World”;
“There is one border vice as yet confined to Mexicans. This is the use of a terrible drug called marihuana. Cocaine, opium and morphine are nursery tonics compared with marijuana. One who takes it becomes instantly mad and proceeds to do whatever is in the mind, with insane courage. An educated Mexican informed the writer that two-thirds of the frightful crimes of Mexico are directly traceable to marihuana; he even suggested Villa was an occasional user of the drug.” (29)
First appearing in the Ogden, Utah paper The Ogden Standard on September 25th, 1915, and then appearing next in the Harrisburg Daily Independent on October 2nd, 1915, a full-page feature article on the dangers of “Deadly Marihuana” was circulated, complete with photograph of Villa looking defiant. The huge headline rang out:
“IS THE MEXICAN NATION ‘LOCOED’ BY A PECULIAR WEED? Deadly Marijuana Rolled In Cigarettes, Becomes the Curse Of the Southern Republic and May Account For the ‘Bravery’ Of ‘Greaser’ Bandits Who Defy the United States … General Villa tells the United States it can ‘go to h—‘. Mexican troops cross the border and shoot down American ranchers and all in all it seems that the nation south of the Rio Grande would just as soon defy and fight the mighty Uncle Sam as to continue its own internal warfare. And why? Are the Mexicans becoming a mightier and braver race, or in the language of Texas, are they becoming ‘locoed’? Reports received here indicate that the sudden burst of bravery on the part of the Mexicans is due to an increased use of the weed known as Marihuana, which as much the same effect as opium or morphine on its users. . . . If a limit of one cigarette were set no great lasting harm might come to the indulger, but in order to keep up the feeling of elation another and perhaps another of the paper wrapped poison is consumed, until the victim is in a state of wild frenzy. When in this condition he often goes on a rampage that brings death to whoever crosses his path. The period of temporary insanity lasts for several hours and is followed by the victim falling into a deep sleep that lasts 24 hours or more. He awakes with no knowledge of what has transpired while the full effects of the drug were upon him. It takes only a few months of constant indulgence in the cigarette habit to bring on permanent insanity.” (30)
Image #27: “IS THE MEXICAN NATION ‘LOCOED’ BY A PECULIAR WEED?” Harrisburg Daily Independent, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, October 2nd, 1915, p. 8
Image #28: Francisco “Pancho” Villa, General Ornelas and their guerrillas after laying down their arms on July 28th, 1920 in Sabinas, Coahuila. https://www.tumblr.com/heirloomganja/641996892717367296/pancho-villa-smoking-mota-marijuana
Image #29: Francisco “Pancho” Villa, General Ornelas and their guerrillas after laying down their arms on July 28th, 1920 in Sabinas, Coahuila. https://www.facebook.com/PanchoVillaMX/photos/a.547582795307325/3804466559618916/?type=3
Image #30: Francisco “Pancho” Villa, General Ornelas and their guerrillas after laying down their arms on July 28th, 1920 in Sabinas, Coahuila. https://www.flickr.com/photos/jesusduarte/5967928169
As is noted by many historians, US newspaper chain owner William Randolph Hearst played a large role in introducing the Mexican word “Marijuana” to the readers of his many newspapers while at the same time hiding its true identity as cannabis. Pancho Villa made repeated raids on Hearst’s Babicora ranch in Chihuahua province beginning in July 1912, and culminating in Villa taking the ranch over in December of 1915 – turning it into his headquarters. (31)
Image #31: “MEXICO WILL TAKE VAST HEARST RANCH; One Million Acres in Chihuahua Area to Become Small Farms — Family to Receive Bonds,” NEW YORK TIMES. Aug. 16 1953, p. 29 https://www.nytimes.com/1953/08/16/archives/mexico-will-take-vast-hearst-ranch-one-million-acres-in-chihuahua.html
After about a year of the Harrison Narcotics Act being enforced, journalists began talking about adding pot to the list of the drugs should be regulated/prohibited nation-wide. In a news story titled “HASHEESH, ABSINTHE ALL ‘DOPE’ IS UNDER A BAN,” we find out that the pharmacist has been selling hasheesh by the name “Cannabis Indica” all these years;
“Hasheesh! Unfamiliar to Oklahomans! The dope is used in large quantities near the Mexican border. Hasheesh is the oriental name – your druggist is probably as innocent as you of the meaning. However, he will readily understand you if you say Cannabis Indica. Cannabis Indica is a drug used extensively by Mexicans. It is one of the worst of the habit-forming drugs. It is one of the least known. It might be added. Cannabis Indica is one of the most adulterated products of the drug world when it reaches the shores of America.” (32)
In 1916, a play opened up in the small Pennsylvanian town known as Altoona, which is interesting in both the way it confuses cannabis with opiates and the way it confuses an oppressive form of discrimination with a virtuous form of white supremacy. The headline reads;
“GRIP OF HASHEESH IN ‘BEGGAR OF CAWNPORE’ – New Triangle Play Shows H. B. Warner as Victim of a Deadly Indian Drug”.
In a review of the play, the synopsis of the plot reveals that the protagonist eventually finds himself
“. . . living in a disreputable hut in Cawnpore, an associate of beggars and thieves, and himself the most disreputable of all. The only thing that keeps him alive is hasheesh, the Hindoo bhang, a good cheap substitute for the expensive morphine. To obtain hasheesh he would beg or steal.” (33)
He must kick his habit and rescue the girl, so “the white man within him awakens,” he goes through hasheesh withdrawal and then goes off to save the day. (34)
Image #32: “GRIP OF HASHEESH IN ‘BEGGAR OF CAWNPORE’ – New Triangle Play Shows H.B. Warner as Victim of a Deadly Indian Drug,” Altoona Tribune, Altoona, Pennsylvania, June 14th, 1916, p. 10
The racism, sexism, classism, and alcohol/tobacco/caffeine supremacism we all suffer from today were institutionalized or consolidated during this time – the birth of the drug war – a time when these forces were so dominant they didn’t bother to hide themselves.
Mexicans received most of the blame for the horrors of cannabis addiction, in spite of it being found in nearly every drug store in America. In a Wellington, Kansas newspaper, the page three headline read: “CANNABIS INDICA – Officers Get Next to a Dope Being Used Extensively by Mexicans – May Fight its Sale.” The entire article is an excellent example of racism in the guise of health concerns;
“Officers have unearthed another vice among the Mexicans and they also believe that some Americans are abdicted (sic) to it. It is the use of what is known as cannabis indica. It is nothing more nor less than a dope, smoked much as opium. Its ill-effect is as great, if not greater than opium, according to authentic advice given the officers. Cannabis indica is a genius of moraceous herbs. The plant is a native of Asia, but has been introduced as a weed into other countries. It is abundantly found in tropical America. It seems that the federal laws governing the sale of narcotics does not reach far enough to forbid the sale of this drug. It is believed however that none of it is being sold in Wellington, although the party giving the information to the officers spoke as if some sales had been made here. It is believed however that the sale of it is not being done by any of the local druggists but by some Mexicans who are shipping it in and disposing of it to the Mexicans who use it. A local druggist was asked concerning it and he reports that his store does not even carry it and he does not believe that any of it is being sold by any other Wellington druggist. This druggist said the dope was taken internally and its effects was much worse than that of opium. It makes the party using it much crazier than opium or any other drug. He never heard of it being smoked. The party informing the officers however, said that it was obtained in a powder form and was smoked as cigarets. It is rumored that the officers are looking into the report and if such a drug habit is being practiced by any of the Mexicans here and the federal laws can be made apply to it, steps will be made to find the parties using it or selling it.” (35)
Image #33: “NEGRO SMOKED ‘LOCO’ WEED.” The Sun, Pittsburg, Kansas, December 5th, 1916, p. 6
Now that there were some laws against cannabis on the books, smuggling became an issue. In December 1916, the page one headline of the Albany, Oregon newspaper read “’Marihuana,’ Mexican Drug, Found Among Militiamen on Border – Arrests Expected.” The United Press story – spread around the country – was about border smuggling near El Paso – ground zero for the war against pot users:
“El Paso, Dec. 20. – Following discovery today that Mexican laborers have introduced marijuana into militia camps along the border, customs officials are on the alert to check smuggling in of the dangerous drug. . . . The drug is peculiar to Mexico and is taken in the form of a cigarette. It is composed of the crushed leaves of a weed. Hallucinations of great physical strength and valor are induced. At the same time the user imagines he is a giant while other persons and objects are dwarfed.” (36)
Image #34: “POLICE SEIZE LOCO WEED DURING RAID,” Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles, California, October 18th, 1917, p.17
Image #35: “‘Workers harvest hemp with a Mogul 10-20 tractor and a hemp harvester’ Wisconsin 1917” http://www.thecannachronicles.com/workers-harvest-hemp-with-a-mongul-1917/
Image #36: “WISCONSIN IS GAINING IN HEMP GROWING,” The Argyle Atlas, Argyle, Wisconsin, October 26th, 1917, p. 6
In 1917, a full page feature article appeared in the Los Angeles Times entitled “THE ROMANCE OF HEMP – MARIHUANA – ‘Destroyer of Intelligence’.” It was a page and a half, a combination of truth and myth, with lots of reefer madness mixed in;
“The history of hasheesh (hemp) commonly called loco weed and known officially as Cannabis Indica, and locally as Marihuana (Mexican opium,) dates back to the days of about B. C. 200. . . . Today the foremost users of the hemp land in one form or another are the Hindus, Arabs, Mohammedans, Burmese and Mexicans. Each has his own way of preparing and using this ‘Destroyer of Intelligence’. . . . the Mexican rolls cigarettes out of it and it variably makes him very vicious, so vicious that Dr. Moreau, a noted authority, classed the effect with the systemic delirium of the violently insane. The writer witnessed two incidents that supported this theory. In the first case, a Mexican after smoking several marihuana cigarettes went locoed. Unhitching a horse that was attached to a baker’s wagon in front of his house he let it into a lane and butchered it. Then raiding the neighboring clothes lines he cut holes in the garments and dipping them into the horses blood dyed them red and hung them back where they belonged. Another instance of a locoed Mexican was attracted by the figure of a man on a billboard. This man seemed to aggravate him. Peeling off his coat he wound it around his arm as one would a bandage. Then producing a knife he sneaked stealthily up to the board. A policeman had edged up behind him and massaged his head with a billy. The hallucinations take about forty-five minutes to wear off.” (37)
Image #37: “Mlle. Regina Flory and M. Jan. Oyra in the Hashish dance at the Gaiety, London. In the play Mlle. Flory fills up on hashish, the inspiration of the dancing dervish, and proceeds to cut up. And Broadway is heartbroken because visitors who have seen the Hashish dance in ‘The Beauty Spot’ yawn at New York’s stage sensations.” “Poor Old Broadway Takes Off Its Hat,” The Buffalo Times, Buffalo, New York, February 2nd, 1919, p. 10
Image #38: “THE STORY OF HEMP HARVESTED IN THE SAN JOAQUIN DELTA,” “HEMP GROWN IN SAN JOAQUIN DELTA IS FAMOUS THROUGHOUT EUROPE – – – THE PROCESS OF HARVESTING,” Stockton Evening and Sunday Record, Stockton, California, April 5th, 1919, p. 39
Image #39: The July 1st, 1919 patent for Schlichten’s famous decorticator. https://www.hempology.org/DECORTICATORS/1919%3B%20SCHLICHTEN%27S%20DECORT.HTML
Image #40: “RAISED LOCO WEED,” Riverside Daily Press, Riverside, California, July 9th, 1919, p. 7
Throughout this decade and the next, the term “marihuana” and “loco weed” were used interchangeably to refer to both cannabis sativa and a bunch of other plants that were known to cause erratic behavior in animals – usually various species of Oxytropis and/or Astragalus. (38) A herbalist could have corrected the mistake, but the herb schools were either already closed or too busy looking for dwindling funding to mount an educational campaign to correct the misinformation.
Image #41: Dewey-Kymington-hemp-1919 https://www.lysterdewey.com/photos/#
The industrial hemp industry – on the verge of massive expansion with new decortication equipment on the horizon – had no idea as to the massive obstacle that was about to be put in its way. For almost none of the public dialogue about industrial hemp mentioned marijuana, and little if any of the stigmatization campaign against marijuana mentioned industrial hemp. Nobody thought the two types of cannabis could or would be confused. Nobody predicted how greasy their rulers would be.
The anti-Mexican/anti-marijuana campaign that began in earnest the late 1800s and continued at a frenzied pace up until cannabis was made illegal across the US in 1937 bore a striking resemblance to the anti-black/anti-cocaine campaign (39) and the anti-Asian/anti-opium campaign, (40) both of which began in earnest in the late 1800s and continued to be ramped up until opium was made illegal in Canada in 1908 and cocaine and opiates were over-regulated and generally phased out across the US beginning in 1914. These campaigns involved racist arguments, racist stereotypes and racist imagery in the form of political cartoons in every newspaper, and subsided somewhat after the desired legislation was introduced, to be replaced with a less obviously racist but nonetheless ubiquitous campaign of stigmatization, which would consolidate and entrench the prohibition in a much more subtle manner.
Image #42: “Demon Rum Leads To Heroin” by Oliver Hereford. Caption below: “And the last state of that man is worse than the first” (from Matthew 12:43-45, KJV) – Editorial cartoon showing “Uncle Sam” bothered by (a dark-skinned) Demon Rum and the various monsters of drug addition which follow him: laudanum, (slant-eyed) opium, cocaine, hashish, heroin, ether and chloral. From Life magazine, June 26 1919. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:DemonRumLeadsToHeroin.jpg
One can clearly see from the above examples that 1) overt or subtle racism combined with 2) ignorance regarding the actual effects of cannabis have been two dominant themes for cannabis-related information in the mass media during this decade. These themes – along with 3) the myth of cannabis’s inherent harm to the young – will echo through time, justifying every harsher punishment. This war on pot is a nightmare that most of the young, the poor and the non-whites in the cannabis community are still unable to awaken from, and most of the people in power are still unwilling to end completely.
Citations
1) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_herbalism#Modern_era
2) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexner_Report
3) H.L. Mencken, “In Defense Of Women”, 1918 https://www.gutenberg.org/files/1270/1270-h/1270-h.htm
4) David Malmo-Levine, “Recent History”, The Pot Book – A Complete Guide to Cannabis, edited by Julie Holland, 2010, Park Street Press, Rochester, Vermont, p. 30
5) Westermeyer J., The pro-heroin effects of anti-opium laws in Asia, Arch Gen Psychiatry. 1976 Sep;33(9):1135-9. http://adlrf.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Westermeyer-1976-The-Pro-Heroin-Effects-of-Anti-Opium-Laws-in-Asia.pdf
See also: “The Amazing World of the Coca Leaf,” David Malmo-Levine, August 31, 2021, citations 167 to 170 https://www.cannabisculture.com/content/2021/08/31/the-amazing-world-of-the-coca-leaf/
Cannabinoid Hyperemesis Syndrome – Genetics, Pesticides, or Both? July 1, 2023 David Malmo-Levine, citations 5 to 10 https://pot-shot.ca/2023/07/01/cannabinoid-hyperemesis-syndrome-genetics-pesticides-or-both/
6) Richard E. Brown, Rockefeller Medicine Men: Medicine and Capitalism in America, 1979, University of California Press, Berkeley, p. 155 https://archive.org/details/rockefellermedic00browrich/page/154
7) “The Marketing of ‘Cannabis Americana’,” FRED GARDNER, MAY 13, 2006, Counterpunch.org https://www.counterpunch.org/2006/05/13/the-marketing-of-quot-cannabis-americana-quot/
8) Morris A. Bealle, The Drug Story, Columbia Publishing Company, Washington, D.C., 1949 https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uc1.$b39371&view=1up&seq=8
https://dokumen.pub/the-drug-story-how-rockefeller-created-dangerous-pharmaceutical-industry-1258497662-9781258497668.html
“The Rockefeller interests, who financed Roosevelt’s original foray into politics, also financed his 1932 blitz at Chicago and took over the direction of some of his major policies when he muscled into the White House.” http://www.whale.to/a/bealle.htm
See also: https://www.heritage-history.com/index.php?c=read&author=josephson&book=roosevelt&story=hearst
9) David Malmo-Levine, “George H. W. Bush – Biggest. Drug Lord. Ever.” 2017 https://pot-shot.ca/2017/05/16/george-h-w-bush-biggest-drug-lord-ever/ Killed Over Pot Part 2: Why Was Kentrail Small Killed? May 11, 2025, David Malmo-Levine, beginning with citation 166. https://pot-shot.ca/2025/05/11/killed-over-pot-part-2-why-was-kentrail-small-killed/
10) Ibid. See also “The aim of this draft convention is to simplify the law relating to narcotics control, to simplify the international control machinery, to ensure control of the cultivation and harvesting of narcotic-producing plants, and to achieve international prohibition of such activities as opium-smoking, opium-eating, and marijuana and coca-leaf consumption.”
“Bishop Griffiths, Dr. Re On Holy See U.N. Unit,” The Tablet, Brooklyn, New York, February 4th, 1961, p. 16
11) “We are particularly indebted for constant and generous assistance to Dr. William H. Welch of Johns Hopkins University …” Medical Education In The United States and Canada, Abraham Flexner, The Carnegie Foundation, Boston, 1910, p. Xvii. See also The Pot Book, p. 30, David Malmo-Levine, “George H. W. Bush – Biggest. Drug Lord. Ever.” 2017 https://pot-shot.ca/2017/05/16/george-h-w-bush-biggest-drug-lord-ever/ George H.W. Bush: Biggest. Drug Lord. Ever. (Part 2) February 1, 2018 David Malmo-Levine. https://pot-shot.ca/2018/02/01/george-h-w-bush-biggest-drug-lord-ever-2/
12) “ASIATICS DENIED LIQUOR FIND SOLICE IN HASHEESH,” The York Daily, York, Pennsylvania, February 18, 1910, p. 4
13) “SUPPRESSION OF ABUSE OF OPIUM AND OTHER DRUGS,” Convention and final protocol signed at The Hague January 23, 1912 https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/International_Opium_Convention
14) “Young Author Writes Weird Hasheesh Essay,” Brooklyn Daily Eagle, Nov. 17, 1912, p. 43
15) “CRAZED BY A WEED, MAN MURDERS,” El Paso Herald, January 2nd, 1913, p. 1
16) “Policeman Lassoes a Drug Crazed Mexican,” El Paso Herald, January 28th, 1914, p. 4
17) “Poisonous Weeds Of Mexico Cause Death,” El Paso Herald, May 9th, 1914, p. 32
18) “MEXICAN SOLDIERS WARNED OF DANGER FROM SEDUCTIVE WEED WHOSE USE CAUSES INSANITY,” The Evening Review, September 18th, 1914, p. 12
19) “Marijuana Weed Will Cause Insanity,” C.S. Lord, New York, Roosevelt Standard, Roosevelt, Utah, November 23rd, 1914, p. 6 & the Ashland Clipper, October 22, 1914, p. 4
20) “Legality of Sale of Cannabis Question,” The Oregon Daily Journal, March 14th, 1915, p. 6
21) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harrison_Narcotics_Tax_Act
22) “Mental Sequelae of the Harrison Law,” New York Medical Journal, 102 (May 15, 1915): 1014. http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/library/studies/cu/cu8.html
23) Cannabis: cure-all or snake oil? David Suzuki examines the science, The Nature Of Things (beginning at 20:50 of the video) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I7c7Fi28yFQ
24) Editorial Comment, American Medicine, 21 (O.S.), 10 (N.S.) (November 1915): 799-800. http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/library/studies/cu/cu8.html
25) “NEW ANTI-MARIHUANA ORDINANCE VERY STRINGENT,” El Paso Herald, June 7th, 1915, p. 9
26) “Ordinance.” El Paso Herald, June 9th, 1915, p. 10
27) “LOCOED MEXICAN IS CAPTURED BY POLICE IN ORCHARD ON M’CLAY,” Santa Ana Register, July 3, 1915, p. 3
28) “JACKSON WANTS COUNTY LAW SO HE CAN LAND ON MARIHUANA GARDEN,” Santa Ana Register, July 28th, 1915, p. 1
29) “CITIES VILLA CONTROLS FILLED WITH VICE DENS,” The Sun, New York, New York, August 26th, 1915, p. 5
30) “IS THE MEXICAN NATION ‘LOCOED’ BY A PECULIAR WEED?” Ogden Standard, September 25th, 1915, magazine section, & Harrisburg Daily Independent, October 2nd, 1915, p. 8
31) David Nasaw, The Chief: The Life of William Randolph Hearst, 2001, Mariner Books, University of Michigan, p. 229, see also: Friedrich Katz, The Life And Times of Pancho Villa, Stanford University Press, Stanford, California, 1998, p. 634; Martin A. Lee, Smoke Signals, Scribner, NY, NY, 2012, p. 51
32) “HASHEESH, ABSINTHE ALL ‘DOPE’ IS UNDER A BAN,” Muskogee Times-Democrat, May 13, 1916, pp. 1, 12
33) “GRIP OF HASHEESH IN ‘BEGGAR OF CAWNPORE’,” Altoona Tribune, June 14th, 1916, p. 10
34) Ibid.
35) “CANNABIS INDICA,” The Wellington Daily News, Wellington, Kansas, July 18th, 1916, p. 3
36) “’Marihuana,’ Mexican Drug, Found Among Militiamen on Border – Arrests Expected,” Albany Daily Democrat, December 20th, 1916, p. 1, see also “TROOPS USE MARIHUANA,” Washington Times, December 19th, 1916, p. 3
37) “THE ROMANCE OF HEMP – MARIHUANA – ‘Destroyer of Intelligence’,” Don Marlin, Los Angeles Times, December 9th, 1917, pp. 10, 17
38) “locoweed 1. a plant of the pea family that contains a toxin which can cause neurological and other symptoms if eaten by livestock. 2. informal•US cannabis.” – Oxford Languages. See also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locoweed_(disambiguation)
39) “The Amazing World of the Coca Leaf,” David Malmo-Levine, August 31, 2021, citations 126 to 155. https://www.cannabisculture.com/content/2021/08/31/the-amazing-world-of-the-coca-leaf/
40) Potshot #14, pp. 4-9 http://pot-shot.ca/