HARRY J ANSLINGER
Commissioner of the US Bureau of Narcotics 1930-1962

Victorian gentlefolk enjoying afternoon tea
The Illustrated Police News (1876)

"Hemp for Victory" by the US Government,  
1943, 14 minutes.
The US government's propaganda piece to restore hemp to help the war effort in World War II. After wiping out the hemp industry and agriculture both before and during the Great Depression, and with federal "marijuana" prohibition implemented in 1937 to help the petrochemical industry, cotton-growing states, and others, US need for fiber during WW II forces the USDA to re-introduce hemp to farmers with this film in 1943.

LOUIS ARMSTRONG
Jazz Musician

Louis Armstrong was first turned onto marijuana in the mid-1920s, and he smoked it all his life, including before performances and recordings. Armstrong was fingered for arrest for smoking marijuana by a rival bandleader in Los Angeles in March of 1931, at which time his career was hijacked by a mysterious man named Johnny Collins who claimed to be Louis's manager and got him out of jail. In 1954 Louis published a book titled, Satchmo: My Life in New Orleans. Gary Giddins (1988) reveals that Joe Glaser, who was Armstrong's manager later in his career, suppressed parts of the book that dealt with marijuana. Armstrong planned to publish a sequel which he said he would call "Gage"--slang for marijuana. He said, at one point, "This whole second book might be about nothing but gage."

Giddins thought the book had been lost, but a recently published document, taken from writings held at the Louis Armstrong House and Archives at Queens College/CUNY, is thought to be the beginnings of it. It begins: "The first time that I smoked Marijuana (or) Gage as they so beautifully calls' it some time, was a couple of years after I had left Flecther Henderson's Orchestra…And I'm telling you, I had myself a Ball…That's why it really puzzles me to see Marijuana connected with Narcotics--Dope and all that kind of crap…It is actually a shame." Sections of the work that survived the censorship show that Armstrong regarded marijuana as an essential element in his life and beneficial to his health.

Sources:

www.veryimportantpotheads.com

Louis Armstrong in His Own Words, Oxford University Press, 1999
Satchmo: The Genius of Louis Armstrong, Gary Giddins, 1988
Ken Burns's documentary Jazz, PBS

Interesting recording of Louis Armstrong 
talking about marijuana as medicine is on-line at: http://www.abcnews.go.com/sections/nightline/DailyNews/
armstrong_010821_feature.html  

The following was Information discovered about Elliot Ness using the "Freedom Of Information Act!!! I know it really isn't about "Reefer Madness" But Prohibition is Prohibition! And it is from that area of time.

Eliot Ness
129 pages

Information about the relationship between Ness, former Prohibition Agent, and the FBI while he was Director of Public Safety, Cleveland, Ohio, during the 1930's, followed by other law enforcement positions.

Click the above link photo to read some transcripts from the book 

Reefer Madness Propaganda Movies

Have you seen the Original 1936's movie cult classic 

In 1936, The liquor industry funded 
the "Infamous Movie"

"Reefer Madness" 

Click The Photo Below To Watch 
This Classic Example of 

Or Watch it here!

http://www.movieflix.com/movie_info.mfx?movie_id=118 

Or check out this great review of the movie  
"Reefer Madness"

http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/5555/reefer.html