38 lines
1.6 KiB
Plaintext
38 lines
1.6 KiB
Plaintext
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>From _Licit & Illicit Drugs_, by Consumer Reports, p. 403:
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...In 1762, "Virginia awarded bounties for hempculture and
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manufacture, and imposed penalties upon those who did not
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produse it."
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George Washington was growing hemp at Mount Vernon three years
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later--presumably for its fiber, though it has been argued that
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Washington was also concerned to increase the medicinal or
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intoxicating potency of his marijuana plants.*
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The asterisk footnote:
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* The argument depends on a curious tradition, which may
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or may not be sound, that the quality or quantity of marijuana
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resin (hashish) is enhanced if the male and female plants are
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separated *before* the females are pollinated. There can be no
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doubt that Washington separated the males and the females. Two
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entries in his diary supply the evidence:
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May 12-13 1765: "Sowed Hemp at Muddy hole by Swamp."
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August 7, 1765: "--began to seperate (sic) the Male from
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the Female Hemp at Do--rather too late."
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George Andrews has argued, in _The Book of Grass: An Anthology of
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Indian Hemp_ (1967), that Washington's August 7 diary entry
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"clearly indiactes that he was cultivating the plant for medicinal
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purposes as well for its fiber." [7] He might have
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separated the males from the females to get better fiber, Andrew
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concedes--but his phrase "rather too late" suggests that he
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wanted to complete the separation *before the female plants were
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fertilized*--and this was a practice related to drug potency
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rather that to fiber culture.
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