[LeeroyJackson]

Long before hemp became infamous in the USA and hence around the world as the "evil weed" marijuana, it had its own rich history closely woven with that of mankind’s. Its various aspects and qualities were used for millennia to clothe, maintain good health, and enrich the many societies that held this plant a close ally in the struggle for a comfortable existence. Hemp's story is as deep as the eons that it came from and as colourful as the misunderstood situation it finds itself in today.

In the beginning

The natural origin of hemp is believed to be the highlands of the Himalayas where it grows wild to this day. Its surrounding cultures initially knew mainly of its psychoactive properties and was revered in Tibet and India as a Herb of spiritual significance. One of the main three Gods of India’s Hinduism, Siva, is closely linked to Ganja, the name given to the smoked flowering head of the plant. Ancient Scriptures dating back thousands of years state in their mythology that hemp was present with Siva when the world was formed. Bhang, the name given to the leaf, was so influential that two major areas were named after it. Bangladesh (meaning "bhang land people"), and Bengal (bhang land).

Hemp seed was spread from this region around the world by birds, wind and explorers. The Aryans who invaded India are known to have taken hemp seed with them to sow for fibre through the Middle East and Europe. Hemp cloth dating back to 8000 BC was also found in the area once known as Mesopotamia and was mentioned in Assyrian scripts where its medical properties were written about; "Used as stomachic and poultice for swelling".
To China

By the third Millennium BC, hemp had established itself as one of the major fibres of the world. No less than 80% of the worlds textiles were hemp. China fully utilized hemp by farming and cultivating it for its strong fibber characteristics and along with silk was its most important textile. Due to the cost of silk, the majority of people in China relied on hemp's cheap but strong fibber for clothing. China was known at the time as the "Land of Mulberry and Hemp" and hemp had a great importance in Chinas culture. Burial sites and tombs of Royalty have been found decorated with various ornate objects, many wrapped in hemp cloth.

Little evidence of the intoxicating effects of hemp is found in the literature of China at this time, however much was written about its industrial uses. The book, the Shu Ching (Circa 2300 BC), states that hemp was used as a superior string to bamboo string to equip their bows for war. Warriors armor was sown with hemp thread and hemp was grown "around every Lords castle to secure his military strength".

Scraps of paper made of hemp, articles of clothing such as slippers and evidence that the hemp seed was used in their diet and medicine suggests that the plant had a broad range of uses in Chinese society.
The great leap

When traders and invaders made hemp seed available to Europe, it could be stated without exaggeration that the seed helped write one of the most important pages of History, by supplying boats with sails, rope and rigging with the strongest fibre available to them.

It was the Scythian traders which carried hemp from Asia through Greece, Russia and into the heart of Europe. Arabs later bought hemp from Africa into Spain. Aside from serving the Greek fleets with sails, it has also been written that "women made sheets of hemp".

Although the Roman Empire did not cultivate much hemp, large quantities were imported from Sura in Babylon to quench their need for its fibber which was in great demand, as was the hemp seed which served as a common food of the time.

Venice became the heart of the Italian hemp industry, with a state operated spinning factory. Hemp was so important to Venetian society that the Venetian senate declared "the security of our galleys and ships, and similarly of our sailors and capital" rests on "the manufacture of cordage in our home of Tana". In fact statutes required that only the best quality hemp rope be used as rigging on Venetian ships for the purpose of security. Hemp helped the Venetian fleet reign over the Mediterranean shipping until the defeat of Venice by Napoleon in 1797.

It is no hidden fact that by the first few hundred years into the first Millennium that most countries in Europe were putting this hardy plant to work as fibber and medicine, but it wasn't until around the 16th century that hemp began to mould the world into the Global society that we have today, for it was around this time that the Nations of Western Europe had begun their struggle of dominion over the seas. England, Holland and Spain were reliant on the sea to obtain trade that would normally reach Venice via the Silk road from Asia. Hemp allowed them to build vessels that would help them generously tap into this market via the oceans. A great demand for hemp was born, as only the long fibres of hemp were strong enough to make sails and rigging that could withstand the treacherous sea journey to the Orient. It was Holland that was ready to supply to the West the hemp needed. The Netherlands had the current technology to meet this demand and quickly became the leading supplier of Canefis, canvas for sails.

It was these sails that carried Colombus and the Mayflower to the New World of America, thus changing the course of History forever.

[LeeroyJackson]

Into the New World

As did many ships of that time, Columbus's boat carried hemp seed for use in case of shipwreck to grow crops for raw materials and as a source of nutrition itself. When they got to America, it appeared that birds and Chinese explorers had already introduced this plant to the shores of the New World where it had taken and was growing naturally. Despite this wild hemp being used for cloth and cordage, it was not initially grown by the newcomers as a crop, for other crops were of more immediate importance such as corn and wheat. However, the demand for textiles rapidly outgrew what the land alone could offer and Governments of the time were known to offer incentives to grow this raw material of short supply. Tobacco crops however, had greater profit returns and a guaranteed market for this addictive commodity.

Despite failed attempts at establishing hemp as a commercial crop in the young America, it had ardent believers in its value as an important resource. Two prominent upholders of this belief were Thomas Jefferson and George Washington, both active hemp farmers.

In the early 1800's America's hemp needs were met by supply from Russia, at the time, the worlds largest exporter of high quality hemp. America did not at this stage have any hemp industry to speak of and any hemp that America did create into rope and such was course and poor in quality. Hemp was mainly used for such things as readying fallow land for crops such as wheat, but by around 1850 hemp production increased domestically and by the turn of the century and the industrial age upon them, new mechanical means of harvesting and retting allowed hemp to be manufactured much more efficiently, however this new era of industrialization also brought about steel cable, steam powered and Iron hulled ships which rendered much of the hemp industry obsolete. Hemp was in decline as cotton also became easier to produce and petrochemicals brought about such things as nylon. Only visionaries such as Henry Ford could see the way of the future was not through finite resources such as were petrochemicals. He spent much money, time and effort in research on Carbohydrate based products, developing all sorts of renewable alternatives for things such as creosote, fuel and plastics (Cannabis yields around 67% Cellulose, the basic building block for organic plastics). He created a car entirely out of renewable biomass, much of which was made from hemp. These philanthropic gestures to industry were not enough to keep the new age of petrochemicals from riding right over what was an obviously better economic and ecological road to take. After all, Plant resource could be grown domestically at quantities desired; petrochemical raw materials had to be, in large, imported at the time. But much was against the hemp crop.
The conspiracy

The cannabis from certain strains of hemp has many beneficial properties that can be utilized in the servitude of medicine. When ingested in small quantities, it serves as, to name a few; a relaxant, broncho-dilator, appetite stimulant, mild aphrodisiac, mood enhancer, analgesic, anti-convulsant and the more recently discovered benefits of reducing intra-ocular pressure in glaucoma suffers with no adverse side effects. Many of these properties were utilized in the preparations of many of the large pharmaceutical companies of the time. The fact that the active ingredient was readily available on the street at a fraction of the price gave these companies a vested interest in banning this plant. In making medicaments that were difficult for the consumer to create or obtain gave the industry a monopoly on what was to become a billion dollar closed industry of the future. The term drugs was shifted from being something that cured to the insidious term that it stands for today; crime, corruption, death.

The Pharmaceutical industry was not the only sector with gains to be had from the removal of cannabis off our cultural landscape. Large business' of the time also had good reason to see its destruction.

William Hearst, owner of a large conglomerate of Newspapers and Pine forest pulp plantations could see the threat that hemp pulp, made from the discarded hurds of the plant, had on his income. His publications often carried ridiculous, impossible stories of the "killer weed". It was in fact this man that coined the derogatory term "Marijuana" to link hemp to the Mexicans which he portrayed as lazy and promiscuous, with nothing to do but smoke "Loco weed". He was an open racist.

On the 12th of August 1930, The Federal Bureau of Narcotics (FBN) was formed to enforce laws against what was deemed illicit substances. The man appointed as the first commissioner to the FBN was Harry Anslinger. Anslinger was appointed by his Uncle, Andrew Mellon, Secretary of the Treasury, who was also owner of Gulf Oil. Mellons vested interests in petrochemical products saw him finance the chemical company Du Pont. DuPont created hydrocarbon based products such as Dacron, Nylon, cellophane and various other plastics.

Between 1935 and 1937, Du Pont lobbied the Chief counsel of the Treasury Department, Herman Oliphant, to prohibit Cannabis in all its forms. On August, 2 1937, a Bill was passed which burdened hemp farmers with a tax that made the farming of hemp unprofitable. The Marijuana tax act was formed and the hemp industry died.

Hemp lost its name, and was forgotten, replaced only by cotton, Nylon and "societies most dangerous enemy, Marijuana". It wasn't until 1942 and the onset of the second world war that hemp was once again brought back into service for the benefit of all. With the imported hemp supply being cut off by the Japanese, and all forms of textile being drawn into the service of protecting the allies, "Marijuana" was promoted as "hemp, the patriotic crop" by the Government which requested thirty six thousand acres of hemp seed to be sown. Once Victory was established, hemp was again deemed evil and lost to industry.
A green future?

The world has now entered the New Millennium. Ecological stewardship has by necessity become our goal as we begin to touch the edges of our finite existence on this planet. Hemp's constant struggle to have us her ally is gaining stronger footing as the world becomes wiser to our peril and our minds learn to think for themselves and glean the truth from the conspiracy. It is obvious that we need to find another way, that mere recycling will not accommodate an increasingly burdened planet, that chemicals will not give us a panacea for the future without a price. All we need has been given us by nature. Nature has granted us a most wonderful plant. It is difficult to bring to mind another resource with so much to offer that is so balanced with the health of our environment and can offer up all the comforts that a modern lifestyle demands. We can look past hemp for a time, but not forever. Why be forced to use hemp tomorrow when we can choose to use it today? It is our past, it is our future, may it be our present as well.

[LeeroyJackson]

https://www.hempmarket.com.au/hemp_history.htm

[Mr GreenJeans]

Very interesting read Leeroy, thanks! -MGJ

[I.M. Boggled]

August 1930, The Federal Bureau of Narcotics (FBN) was formed to enforce laws against what was deemed illicit substances. The man appointed as the first commissioner to the FBN was Harry Anslinger.

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Marijuana - Assassin of Youth
by H. J. Anslinger
U.S. Commissioner of Narcotics,
(The American Magazine, July 1937)

"Not long ago the body of a young girl lay crushed on the sidewalk after a plunge from a Chicago apartment window. Everyone called it suicide, but actually it was murder. The killer was a narcotic known to America as marijuana, and to history as hashish.

Used in the form of cigarettes, it is comparatively new to the United States and as dangerous as a coiled rattlesnake. How many murders, suicides, and maniacal deeds it causes each year, especially among the young, can only be conjectured.

In numerous communities it thrives almost unmolested, largely because of official ignorance of its effects. Marijuana is the unknown quantity among narcotics. No one knows, when he smokes it, whether he will become a philosopher, a joyous reveler, a mad insensate, or a murderer.

The young girl's story is typical. She had heard the whisper which has gone the rounds of American youth about a new thrill, a cigarette with a "real kick" which gave wonderful reactions and no harmful after-effects.

With some friends she experimented at an evening smoking party. The results were weird. Some of the partiers went into paroxysms of laughter, others of mediocre musical ability became almost expert; the piano dinned constantly. Still others found themselves discussing weighty problems with remarkable clarity. The girl danced without fatigue throughout a night of inexplicable exhilaration.

Other parties followed, finally there came a gathering at a time when the girl was behind in her studies and greatly worried. Suddenly, as she was smoking, the thought of a solution to her school problems came. Without hesitancy she walked to a window and leaped to her death. Thus madly can marijuana "solve" one's difficulties.

It gives few warnings of what it intends to do to the human brain. Last year a young marijuana addict was hanged in Baltimore for criminal assault on a ten year old girl. In Chicago, two marijuana-smoking boys murdered a policeman.

In Florida, police found a youth staggering about in a human slaughterhouse. With an ax he had killed his father, mother, two brothers, and a sister. He had no recollection of having committed this multiple crime. Ordinarily a sane, rather quiet young man, he had become crazed from smoking marijuana.

In at least two dozen comparatively recent cases of murder or degenerate sex attacks, marijuana proved to be a contributing cause. In Ohio a gang of seven marijuana addicts, all less than 20, were caught after a series of 38 holdups. The boys' story was typical of conditions in many cities. One of them said they first learned about "reefers" in high school, buying the cigarettes at hamburger stands, and from peddlers who hung around the school. He told of "booth joints" where you could get a marijuana cigarette and a sandwich for a quarter, and of the shabby apartments of women who provided the cigarettes and rooms where boys and girls might smoke them together.

His recollection of the crimes he had committed was hazy. "When you get to floating", he explained, "it's hard to keep track of things. If I had killed somebody on one of those jobs, I'd never had known it. Sometimes it was over before I realized that I'd been out of my room."

It is the useless destruction of the youth which is so heartbreaking to all of us who labor in the field of narcotics suppression."

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"Marijuana is taken by ...musicians. And I'm not speaking about good musicians, but the jazz type..." —Harry J. Anslinger, Commissioner of the US Bureau of Narcotics, 1930 - 1962

[LeeroyJackson]

In the world of wonderfull and whacky articles about MJ here are some more ive come across just for kicks.

https://www.overgrow.com/edge/showthr...30#post5496730

Cheers and hope your all doing well,
Leeroy

[LeeroyJackson]

I wonder how many more girls have jumped out of windows since smoking hash.

[Harry Gypsna]

oh look, a girl has just got soo stoned and jumped out of MY window, no wurriz, it happens all the time to us insane, murderous reefer addicts, lol, hahahahahaa

[alankluger]

Went to an all night party and friends were passing around a euphoric enhancer to help us stay in the mood and party all night into the wee hours of the morning. And that it did! I tried other mood enhancers but they were not very effective Trip2night is a great euphoric enhancer and worked wonders for me. It comes in a powdered form and mixes easily.

HELLO

YOU ALWAYS BUMP INTO A TOPIC OF 5 YEARS AGO

Namaste