WHY WON'T THE GOVERNMENT LET AMERICANS GROW HEMP

We had to have hemp. We had to have hemp.

Pearl Harbor had been bombed. The country was at war, and we needed hemp for all sorts of things. Fifty years ago, hemp was our principal source of cordage—rope for ships, oakum for caulking. Its oil went into paints, varnishes, soap.

With overseas supplies in jeopardy, we would have to strip the stems for canvas and paper. We had to have hemp.

Stateside, the plant grew best in the Midwest—Indiana, Illinois, Michigan—some of the very best in Indiana. On advice from Washington, Hoosier farmers were directed to plant it: “Hemp for Victory.” The slogan was tantamount to an order. Men who had fought weeds all their lives now plowed under corn and beans and planted what they had long called a weed.

From the government’s point of view, it worked. Midwest farmers converted 300,000 acres to hemp. For generations a ditch weed allowed to grow along the roadsides to hold the soil had suddenly become Indiana’s most important crop. From its stems came the fibers that became products essential in wartime—especially fabrics and cordage no longer available from markets controlled by Japan.

When the war ended, demand collapsed. There were cheaper ways to make paper and canvas, better ways to make paints and varnishes. The government told American farmers it was time to return to food grains.

But many Indiana farmers had invested too much—in time, talent, and technology—to turn back easily. Returning to corn and beans would be prohibitively costly. So, they kept planting hemp. Even under threat of punishment, they kept planting.

And over the years the methods changed. What had begun in open fields moved, in some places, behind closed doors. Lights were timed. Watering was automated. Varieties were selected and bred. In controlled rooms, row upon row rose from cubes of rock wool. The yields increased. The profits did, too.

Government agencies tried to stop them, but they were no match for the monster they—the government—had created. A bushel of corn might sell for two dollars and fifty cents; a bushel of manicured hemp could bring thousands. It was no longer the stems that industry wanted; it was the leaves. The stems, once precious, were nearly worthless. The money was in the foliage.

For what’s made from those leaves of that same plant is… marijuana.

And now you know the rest of the story.