Great Moments In Weed History W/ Abdullah And Bean

Reefer, muggles, gage — whatever jazz-age slang you prefer, marijuana most definitely played an outsized role in the development of this most unique and influential American art form. From the formation of the first ever jam sessions to the racial integration of the leading jazz bands, cannabis culture and consciousness of the era pushed musicians and audiences alike towards a higher appreciation of authentic, improvised, expansive self expression. As jazz evolved into the world’s most popular musical genre, weed-friendly musicians began to tour, leaving a trail of newly initiated reefer smokers (and freshly planted reefer seeds) in their wakes. A wide range of jazz greats also made approving references to “Mary Warner” in songs like Reefer Man (Cab Calloway), If You’re a Viper (Fats Waller), Texas Tea Party (Benny Goodman), Muggles (Louis Armstrong), Gimme a Reefer (Bessie Smith), When I Get Low, I Get High (Ella Fitzgerald), and I'm Feeling High and Happy (Gene Krupa). We explore this incredible underground

Alice B. Toklas was born in 1877 in San Francisco, but she relocated to Paris after the earthquake of 1906 destroyed 80% of her hometown. And on the very day she arrived in the City of Lights, Alice met and fell in love with Gertrude Stein—also an American expatriate, and a collector of important work by not yet renown masters like Cezanne, Gaugiun, Renoir, Matisse and Picasso. These very painters would bring friends and rivals to the apartment shared by Gertrude and Alice at all hours to show off their latest masterpieces, and so, one of the art world’s most celebrated salons was born, which would draw in the leading lights of Paris in the 1920s, including Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Sinclair Lewis, Ezra Pound, T. S. Eliot, Charlie Chaplin, and Salvador Dali. So what’s this all got to do with the invention of the modern weed brownie? That’s an incredible intercontinental and cross-cultural tale of culinary adventure that involves Moroccan hashish makers, an avant-garde artist, a literary scandal,

In 2013, renegade weed activists in Philadelphia vowed to host a monthly public smoke-out in front of the Liberty Bell. Despite clashing with heavily armed federal forces, their efforts brought cannabis decriminalization to the birthplace of American democracy.  Check out N.A. Poe's YouTube channel, and you can follow him on Twitter @NikkiAllenPoe.  PATREON Please support Great Moments in Weed HIstory on Patreon. Supporters get exclusive access to video shows and seshes, plus access to cool rewards like a signed book or signature lighter. And it truly helps us make the best show possible. 

On New Year's Eve 2016, Zach “Jesus Hands” Fernandez risked his life to change two letters on the world's most iconic sign. For the very first time, he tells Abdullah and Bean exactly how he did it, and why it was worth the risk. They also get pretty blazed and have a lot of laughs. Jesus Hands says that when the deed was done, he celebrated by smoking a joint of Jack Herer and listening to the song "The World' Smiling Now" by Jim James of My Morning Jacket. The episode also tells the story of Danny Finegood, the first person to change the Hollywood sign to say Hollyweed in 1976. PATREON Please support Great Moments in Weed HIstory on Patreon. Supporters get exclusive access to video shows and seshes, plus access to cool rewards like a signed book or signature lighter. And it truly helps us make the best show possible. 

In 1973, twenty-year-old Valerie Leveroni Corral was riding in a Volkswagen bug through the Nevada desert when a small airplane swooped down low enough that its torque caused the vehicle to careen end-over-end. Valerie was flung against the roof and doors, causing brain damage, epilepsy and debilitating migraines. She was then prescribed a staggering range of pharmaceuticals to deal with the aftermath, but they proved largely ineffective in stopping her convulsions and grand mal seizures. And the side-effects left her a zombie. Then her husband Mike read about a government-funded research paper that showed unique compounds found in cannabis can reverse the growth of cancerous tumors and help control laboratory-induced seizures. What happened next is a story of resistance and resilience that involved an iconic weed garden, an armed police raid, a barricade of cannabis patients in wheelchairs and walkers, and a standoff on the steps of City Hall pitting the Wo/men's Alliance for Medical Marijuana (WAMM) against

Everybody knows Cheech and Chong as the world’s ultimate stoner icons, buthow did they rise from obscure road comics to writing, directing and starring in one of themost influential movies of all time? In 1967 in Vancouver, Canada, a draft resister from East LA named Richard Marin met a musician named Thomas Chong - whose family owned a local burlesque house. Fusing their comedic super powers in a crucible fueled by love for weed and improv, Cheech and Chong grew from performing in between burlesque acts, to Grammy-nominated comedians, leaving one world left to conquer: Hollywood. Up in Smoke may not be the first ever stoner comedy, but it’s the one thatchanged popular entertainment forever. And if you’re asking yourself “How Did This GetMade?,” rest assured that it happened in the most Cheech and Chong way possible. And Abdullah and Bean try to piece together the many ways that Up in Smoke predicted the future, despite having a plot that barely makes sense. LISTENING NOTE: Roll up a comically oversized joint

What would happen if one of the biggest heroes and one of the biggest villains in professional wrestling got arrested for smoking a joint together? Just ask babyface "Hacksaw" Jim Duggan and legendary heel The Iron Sheik. In 1987, that very fate befell two of the WWF's biggest stars. The aftermath of those shocking arrests not only changed the trajectory of both their lives forever, it also forever transformed pro wrestling in ways the sport is still grappling with. Also in this episode, we learn how the Iron Sheik fled his homeland of Iran in fear that the Shah—who came to power thanks to a CIA-back coup—was about to assassinate him. And we chart how a first-generation viral video attacking Seinfeld star Michael Richards for racist comments gave the Iron Sheik a third act as an online heel and a Howard Stern show favorite. For more on The Iron Sheik’s amazing life, check out the documentary The Sheik and Jim Duggan's autobiography Hacksaw. PATREON Please support Great Moments in Weed HIstory on Patreon. Supp

Ever wonder what President Barack Obama was like as a pot-smoking teenager in Hawaii? We did, so we dug deep into Barry's time with his high school weed crew, the Choom Gang. “In Hawaii, chooming means indulging in pakalolo,” fellow Choom Gang member Tom Topolinski explains to Frontline. And yes, pakalolo is yet another slang term for cannabis, as heard in Hawaiian musician Don Ho’s classic song, “Who Is the Lolo Who Stole My Pakalolo?” You might remember seeing this young version of Obama portrayed by Jordan Peele in a classic Key and Peele sketch. The former president famously admitted that he used cannabis as a youth and that he surely inhaled as “that was the point.” Though he opposed cannabis legalization as a senator, his public stance evolved over the course of his tenure, and his direction to federal authorities to lay off state-level efforts to legalize cannabis makes him the most progressive president on the cannabis issue to date. Some say it’s just good policy, but we say it calls for a special sh

In 1964, Bob Dylan met The Beatles for the first time, and after a bit of awkward small talk, offered to share some of his marijuana. Based on a misheard lyric, Dylan assumed the Fab Four already blazed, but it turned out this would be their first time "turning on." And so begins our Season 1 finale, in which we explore one of the most iconic smoke sessions of all time. PATREON Please support Great Moments in Weed HIstory on Patreon. Supporters get exclusive access to video shows and seshes, plus access to cool rewards like a signed book or signature lighter. And it truly helps us make the best show possible. 

Dennis Peron (1945-2018) first discovered the healing power of cannabis while serving in Vietnam. After smuggling two pounds of high-grade herb home from the front, he became a charismatic and defiant leader of San Francisco's medical cannabis and gay rights movements. A fiery street-fighting optimist, he suffered multiple stints in prison and even took a bullet in a police raid—all without ever giving up or backing down. PATREON Please support Great Moments in Weed HIstory on Patreon. Supporters get exclusive access to video shows and seshes, plus access to cool rewards like a signed book or signature lighter. And it truly helps us make the best show possible. 

Amsterdam has long been a safe haven for cannabis freedom, but few today remember the subversive, anarchistic, defiantly pro weed Dutch Provo movement (short for provocateurs), which used a mix of radical street theater and outrageous political pranks to expose the authorities as out of touch and incompetent, while bringing coffeeshops, seed banks, and legal cannabis to the Netherlands. PATREON Please support Great Moments in Weed HIstory on Patreon. Supporters get exclusive access to video shows and seshes, plus access to cool rewards like a signed book or signature lighter. And it truly helps us make the best show possible. 

Mary Jane Rathbun was already selling weed brownies in San Francisco when the AIDS crisis hit. So the self described "little old lady" started volunteering at hospitals and crisis centers, where she made her "magically delicious" treats available for free to those in desperate need. And when the cops tried to stop this mission of mercy, "Brownie Mary" had a simple message for the authorities: Go F*ck Yourself. PATREON Please support Great Moments in Weed HIstory on Patreon. Supporters get exclusive access to video shows and seshes, plus access to cool rewards like a signed book or signature lighter. And it truly helps us make the best show possible. 

In 1798, Napoleon invaded Egypt in a failed attempt to install colonial rule. French soldiers did succeed in enthusiastically adopting the local custom of consuming hashish, a practice with a long, storied history in the Islamic world. When the occupation ended, they brought a taste for cannabis home that lead directly to the formation of Paris’s famed Club des Hashischins, where Alexandre Dumas, Victor Hugo, Honoré de Balzac, and Charles Baudelaire drank coffee laced with weed and got weird with it. PATREON Please support Great Moments in Weed HIstory on Patreon. Supporters get exclusive access to video shows and seshes, plus access to cool rewards like a signed book or signature lighter. And it truly helps us make the best show possible. 

After 29 years in lock-up on a first-time cannabis smuggling charge, Robert "Black Tuna" Platshorn published his memoirs of bringing in planeloads of Santa Marta Gold from Colombia and getting snared in one of the DEA's earliest operations. Then America's longest serving prisoner in the War on Marijuana dedicated himself to pushing for legalization, with a surprising twist.

Every year on April 20th (4/20), cannabis lovers celebrate their favorite plant with festivals, protests, marches, and smoke-outs great and small. So what are the grassroots origins of this high holiday? And how did it spread around the world? PATREON Please support Great Moments in Weed HIstory on Patreon. Supporters get exclusive access to video shows and seshes, plus access to cool rewards like a signed book or signature lighter. And it truly helps us make the best show possible. 

In 1967, Harvard Medical School professor Dr. Lester Grinspoon set out to research marijuana sufficiently to convince his best friend—famed astronomer Carl Sagan—to stop smoking weed all the time. But after making a fateful trip to the library, Grinspoon returned convinced the case against Mary Jane was all lies and propaganda. So Lester and Carl began enthusiastically exploring the cannabis "Cosmos" together, igniting the medical cannabis movement and sparking many stoned epiphanies along the way. PATREON Please support Great Moments in Weed HIstory on Patreon. Supporters get exclusive access to video shows and seshes, plus access to cool rewards like a signed book or signature lighter. And it truly helps us make the best show possible. 

A legendary figure in the music world, Fela Kuti is best known for inventing Afro Beat, battling the Nigerian government, declaring his own sovereign nation, and loudly proclaiming his love of cannabis. Join Abdullah and Bean for the story of his greatest triumph over the cops! PATREON Please support Great Moments in Weed HIstory on Patreon. Supporters get exclusive access to video shows and seshes, plus access to cool rewards like a signed book or signature lighter. And it truly helps us make the best show possible. 

Jesus didn’t smoke weed. But is it possible cannabis was the key ingredient in the Holy Anointing Oil used by Christ and his disciples to perform healing miracles? Join Abdullah and Bean for a deep dive into an herbal mystical mystery of Biblical proportions. PATREON Please support Great Moments in Weed HIstory on Patreon. Supporters get exclusive access to video shows and seshes, plus access to cool rewards like a signed book or signature lighter. And it truly helps us make the best show possible. 

Famed poet, memoirist and civil rights icon Maya Angelou had a profoundly life altering experience the first time she smoked some “grifa”—in 1946, with two lesbian prostitutes she met while working as a waitress. “I learned new postures and developed new dreams,” Angelou wrote of her cannabis muse. “From a natural stiffness I melted into a grinning tolerance. For the first time, life amused me.” PATREON Please support Great Moments in Weed HIstory on Patreon. Supporters get exclusive access to video shows and seshes, plus access to cool rewards like a signed book or signature lighter. And it truly helps us make the best show possible. 

From his first toke in West Texas in 1954, to the joint he's most definitely puffing on right now, Willie Nelson has been America's ultimate weed icon for over sixty years. In the first ever episode of the podcast,, Bean tells Abdullah about the time the Red Headed Stranger smoked a "fat Austin torpedo" on the roof of the White House. PATREON Please support Great Moments in Weed HIstory on Patreon. Supporters get exclusive access to video shows and seshes, plus access to cool rewards like a signed book or signature lighter. And it truly helps us make the best show possible.