It turns out fields of marijuana plants used to cover whole sections of Brooklyn. This was back in the ’50s, back when the Brooklyn scene was still “cool.”
At the time, weed grew everywhere, with seven foot high plants sprouting in fields from Williamsburg to Cobble Hill to East New York. In 1951 alone, a division of the Department of Sanitation called the “White Wing Squad” confiscated and destroyed 41,000 pounds of the plant.
Which is a shame, because 41,000 pounds of weed is just enough to enjoy an episode of “The Voice.”
Another takeaway from the NPR piece is that there were actually a few intelligent people in the ’50s who weren’t panicking about the freaky jazz plant. There’s audio of an episode of WNYC’s “Campus Press Conference,” in which State Supreme Court Justice John Murtagh attempts to deflate the “Reefer Madness”-type hysteria about the drug, even going so far as to say that it’s less dangerous than smoking. Whoa.
Unfortunately his efforts were in vain, and the expensive failure that is the War on Drugs rages on. Unless you’re in Colorado, in which case you’re probably too high to read this anyway.
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