Tryptamines did hippies take shrooms?

[Morninggloryseed]

Seeing as he was already researching MDA analogs more than 10 years before with MMDA, I'm surprised he didn't stumble upon (or think of) MDMA in the 60s.

Yeah exactly...especially considering the patent! But then he couldn't do everything now could he?

 

[PriestTheyCalledHim]

Well the hippy scene of the early 60s was basically the RC scene. Wasn't called RCs back then but you directly bought a new and under researched chemical from a company. [<-You know this, why are you getting all worked up? :D] Not really an RC scene no, but I meant the chemicals that were going around that were interesting.

I read a biography of John Waters not "Role Models" but it was either "Shock Value" or the book about his obsessions and in an interview or essay he said how in the 60s before Woodstock or very early 70s he and other dreamlanders like Divine took MDA, LSD when it was legal, or speed like black beauties. He and his friends didn't get it from an RC company but it was sold on the streets of the then small town they were living in for the summer.

I have read biographical essays by the actress Cookie Mueller who described how in the early 70s in this small town where she, John Waters, and other dreamlanders would live for the summer how she became an amateur tattoo artist and how people would take mushrooms on the beach during the day and then want a 3rd eye tattooed on their face and she wouldn't give them a tattoo of that but would tell them to come back when they were not tripping.

The last of Mueller's quotes, an elegy of her intent and existence, was written shortly before her death:

"Fortunately I am not the first person to tell you that you will never die. You simply lose your body. You will be the same except you won't have to worry about rent or mortgages or fashionable clothes. You will be released from sexual obsessions. You will not have drug addictions. You will not need alcohol. You will not have to worry about cellulite or cigarettes or cancer or AIDS or venereal disease. You will be free."-Cookie Mueller

 

[JackARoe]

It may not be a surprise to you to meet someone who has successfully treated their cluster headaches with psilocybin is rare. I've read .1 percent of people ever experience them let alone become a physician; I.e. physician heal thyself.

It is few and far between to even know anyone but online that suffers from cluster headaches. I had these from age 26-42. It would happen in the Sring and Fall, but not everytime. I would wake up about 2 hours after falling asleep to a searing iron hot pain ripping through the right side of my upper front head. It would last about 45 minutes. I'd fall back to sleep and wake up two hours later again. Really, I remember begging the Universe for it to stop a few times. It was the most painful thing that brought me to tears. Then I would pop two excedrine for the caffeine and aspirin to relieve. It sucked to have to take caffeine in the middle of the night, but the vasoconstriction was needed. The episodes lasted about a month, then go away until another 6 months to a year. The GOOD news is I had heard they go away as we get older. And I can attest it has been 8 years since I had any. I don't think I will ever see that again. So there is hope.

The earliest I had heard of anyone even having mushrooms was 1978. I do remember some of the stupid names for PCP like "crystal tea". That was suppose to be THC. Or mescaline tablets being mescaline. Yeah right. People really believed that but a few people that did any research realized just how big a true tablet of mescaline would have to be, and those little blue barrels weren't it.

 

[DrunkardsDream]

Where do you get your information again? I hear a lot of conjecture on your part and I think you have the concept of linear time mixed up. MDMA was not discovered to be active until the mid 70s when Shulgin first published about it. There was no MDMA in the '60s......PERIOD. 4-HO-DET and the phosphate ester were manufactured by Sandoz for a short while in the early 60s. It dissapeared and did not reappear until early 2001. If you have information to the contrary please cite it.

I don't think I am worked up at all, very calm, but even if I were.....I definitely have a pet peeve when people use conjecture to make statements of fact. And what chemicals do you speak of that Shulgin learned of from others? Shulgin was the only person synthesizing psychedelics besides Sandoz. I forget who first made DMT in the 30s but it wasn't known to be active until the mid 50s when it was found in magic plants...then DET and DPT were made and that was the end of synthetic psychedelics until Shulgin started his mission. Remember everything was published....the fact that things were published is how I know you either are privy to information NO ONE ELSE has...of you are making stuff up as you go. Remember, the only other known psychedelic chemist in the 60s was Owsley...he is the one who read of DOM in a paper Shulgin published and subsequently distributed it as "STP." If there were others...who were they? And how do you know about them?

In the mid to late 70s, Michael Valentine and a small handful of other researchers started publishing, pretty sure Valentine cowrote a paper with Shulgin on DIPT analogues in 1977. Other than that...were were no psychedelic chemists in the 60s and 70s that have ever come forward. Remember Shulgin was contracted by the DEA to analyze samples seized that could not be identified. Of anyone out there...he is the one who knows 'what was going around.'

I know sometime in the mid 70s, PMA was found as a black market drug.....and certainly up to the mid 60s you could order MDA, ibogaine, and mescaline from chemical supply houses...but to suggest that were 'chemicals going around that were interesting' is nothing more than conjecture....As far as I can tell based on a lifetime of research...If I am wrong, I will happily admit it but you must cite a source for your information.

Edit: Even the a-MT that Kesey used was stolen from whatever US research facility was using it at the time. From all available literature, the Pranksters were the only people who got a-MT back then. I am sure you could order it from a chemical supply house but nobody seemed to until perhaps the mid 80s...more likely the 90s.

I read an interview with someone that claimed at Kesey's Acid Tests LSD was not used there or given to people; but it was actually AMT or what they called IT-290.

I also found this which was published in 1970 erowid.org/references/refs_view.php?A=ShowDoc1&ID=1149 and it has to do with what you are writing about.

Were you even around and using drugs in the 60s or early/mid 70s MGS? I was and yeah there were all sort of drugs around including STP/DOM and other drugs that were sold on the black market and if you wanted them you could get them and you didn't have to mail away for them; but you'd ask around and somebody would have them or know somebody who could get some, and people would just take them then as they do with new research chems now.

 

[squidhead]

and other psycedelics? (mescaline, etc) than just acid?

Just wondering as I personally get a much more spiritual, headspacey trip from shrooms, where I almost feel like i'm a part of nature. As opposed to acid, which has some moments at the peak where I feel quite trancendent, but for the most part is mostly pretty visuals/ patterns.

Because of this I would have thought shrooms would appeal more to hippes than acid? Shrooms are also from nature itself, not a chemical that comes from a lab.

More of a historical/ sociological question than anything but was just wondering so thought i'd make the thread. Dunno if it belongs more in drug culture than here.

Absolutely we hippies ate mushrooms...& peyote buttons, LSD, Mescaline...the 4 basic food groups for psychedelic drugs. I'd do mushrooms & buttons again, but I doubt I'd do LSD or Mescaline nowadays. Being 59 yrs old, the hallucinogenics that are manufactured might be a bit too heavy for me at this time. However, the organic psylocibin(sp?) mushrooms & peyote from a cactus would be plenty for my cranium now.

 

[DrunkardsDream]

No, barely any hippies were taking mushrooms in the 60s. A few went to Mexico to take them but that's about it. The only psilocybin mushrooms known about were those in the mexico.

Do you actually know that there's a large number of species of psychedelic mushrooms and that people have been taking them for thousands of years? Yes even in the United States too.

You are thinking about the very late 50s and how the only white people who took them were mycologists, rich tourists, and non-native people in native countries where they are used-BTW they are used by indigenous people in many countries south of the border not just Mexico.

Again, people did take mushrooms in the 60s. I have noticed how people on this thread who claim otherwise like MorningGlorySeed and others were not even around or taking drugs in the 60s and 70s.

 

[kidklmx]

Do you actually know that there's a large number of species of psychedelic mushrooms and that people have been taking them for thousands of years? Yes even in the United States too.

You are thinking about the very late 50s and how the only white people who took them were mycologists, rich tourists, and non-native people in native countries where they are used-BTW they are used by indigenous people in many countries south of the border not just Mexico.

Again, people did take mushrooms in the 60s. I have noticed how people on this thread who claim otherwise like MorningGlorySeed and others were not even around or taking drugs in the 60s and 70s.

The great Mushroom boom was in the 70s though, the Mushroom Growers Guide from Ot Oss and On Oeric was perceived as revolutionary. McKenna was one of the earliest people to grow <forgot the species' name> outside of it's natural habitad. Maybe people were taking P.Cubensis that was growing in the area, but people were certainly not growing them themselves. Or at least, that was my understanding

He first stumbled upon mushrooms at La Chorrera and it was his first time taking mushrooms. Such a seasoned user would've known about their existence if they were around, no?

 

[Morninggloryseed]

You are thinking about the very late 50s and how the only white people who took them were mycologists, rich tourists, and non-native people in native countries where they are used-BTW they are used by indigenous people in many countries south of the border not just Mexico.

.

Prove it. The Central American mushroom culture was not first partaken upon by a honkey until Gordon Wasson in mid 50s. There is no evidence of magic mushroom use outside Central America, ever by white guys until Gordon Wasson. If you know differently, cite your source man.

 

[squidhead]

Prove it. The Central American mushroom culture was not first partaken upon by a honkey until Gordon Wasson in mid 50s. There is no evidence of magic mushroom use outside Central America, ever by white guys until Gordon Wasson. If you know differently, cite your source man.

"Cite your source, man"?? How about 1st-hand partaking of mushrooms & peyote buttons? & this was Chicago where we were all eating 'shrooms back in 1969/70/71/72 etc, etc.
DrunkardsDream knows what he's talking about.

 

[Morninggloryseed]

I don't deny the experience of others. I do ask for a source for second hand information if one can be provided.

 

[Ismene]

Do you actually know that there's a large number of species of psychedelic mushrooms and that people have been taking them for thousands of years? Yes even in the United States too.

Your first point is undeniably true - the second bit that everyone could identify them and realised they were psilocybin is the bit that doesn't ring true. How would people in the US have identified psilocybin mushrooms? There were no books - no whites even realised you could trip off them till the late 50s.

they are used by indigenous people in many countries south of the border not just Mexico.

I thought their use was limited more to the Mexico area than furthur south - ayahuasca seems the mainstay in places like Brazil.

 

[Ismene]

The great Mushroom boom was in the 70s though, the Mushroom Growers Guide from Ot Oss and On Oeric was perceived as revolutionary.

I don't know whether I'd call it a boom. Even now - when the PF tek is a lot easier to follow than it was in 1976 - very few people can be bothered to grow their own shrooms.

 

[kidklmx]

No, but there's a lot more refferences to Mushrooms in pop culture than before that time

 

[PriestTheyCalledHim]

Your first point is undeniably true - the second bit that everyone could identify them and realised they were psilocybin is the bit that doesn't ring true. How would people in the US have identified psilocybin mushrooms? There were no books - no whites even realised you could trip off them till the late 50s.

they are used by indigenous people in many countries south of the border not just Mexico.

I thought their use was limited more to the Mexico area than furthur south - ayahuasca seems the mainstay in places like Brazil.

The use of Psilocybin mushrooms is not limited to only Mexico as they grow in various other central American and South American countries.

OK, whatever. I guess you enjoy arguing and always being "right". 8) You're forgetting that certain species of psychedelic mushrooms grow wild in the Pacific Northwest and American Southeast, and people ate those both fresh and dried in the 60s and early 70s. I know people who were not hippies at all or involved in the counterculture or anti-Vietnam war effort and they were the polar opposite of that, and they were stationed in a central American country while in the military and they took Psilocybin mushrooms and that was in the late 60s or very early 70s.

The person I wrote about in my previous post was in Panama and also went to Costa Rica and Psilocybin mushrooms were very easily available in both countries in the late 60s and early 70s.

Psilocybin mushrooms are used in Peru, in Brasil, Colombia, and in Venezuela as well as in other South American countries and in other countries along the isthmus besides CR and Panama.

 

[Ismene]

Blue acid's mellow, yellow's edgy, orange is enlightenment itself, and 'mushroom' acid is "psilocybin"!

I hear the blue is righteously mellow :D

Psilocybin mushrooms are used in Peru, in Brasil, Colombia, and in Venezuela as well as in other South American countries and in other countries along the isthmus besides CR and Panama.

How long have those countries starting using mushrooms tho? Since they read about them on the internet?

 

[GreenMachine]

Reading comprehension is something that you REALLY need to work on, and lay off the drugs they're not helping you.

I did not claim anywhere in my post that the majority of deadheads who were taking psychedelic mushrooms were really taking store bought mushrooms that are laced with LSD. I did however claim that we deadheads as a whole in the 60s, 70s, and even 80s and 90s were somehow more into psychedelic drugs as a whole than people were in the 60s and early 70s.

You were not around in the 60s or 70s, so you wouldn't know how mainstream psychedelics were back then and yes in the 60s through 80s people did claim that low dose LSD sold as microdots or barrels was "mescaline" or that PCP in powder or pill/capsule format was THC or even LSD. Heck you've probably never even been to an actual grateful dead show when Jerry Garcia was still alive. You can listen to all of the taped/archived shows you want that or go to see the burntout members like Bob Weir and Phil Lesh/further with fake Jerry are still chugging along the dead moneymaking machine but it's not the same as actually seeing a live dead show. It's not my fault that your so called "friends" and family members wasted years and decades of their lives on tour.

I went to tons of dead shows over the decades but I never got into touring or the whole "lifestyle" around touring which is basically being homeless and living in poverty by choice, since I had better things to do, and I would just go to a large number of shows during the year or in the summer. Sometimes I used drugs, and sometimes I didn't. There were no "wharf rats" back then and that did not start until the 80s. The people who didn't use drugs at shows were just either not into using them at the time as I was like this, or they were just more into the music and not total scenesters who were more into the parkinglot party scene than the music, and even still the majority of people at dead shows were into just drinking booze and smoking herb and it wasn't some huge nonstop trip fest like people who like to revise the past like to claim it was.

My friend and his husband who took what they thought were shrooms but were actually store bought mushrooms are from San Francisco and yeah even there you could get ripped off or get other drugs that you thought were one thing but were really something else. You've also probably always had access to factual information about drugs that's written by chemists, or sites by and for drug users like erowid. There was not really any of that in the 60s, 70s, or 80s and yeah even at dead shows and in mainstream society, you would have shady people who would sell weak or fake drugs.

wow, for a deadhead you are kind of being an asshole in this thread.

and believe it or not, people buying drugs that are passed off as something else probably happens more today than ever. just look at what is in the "molly" people are selling these days.

for the record i dont doubt your story though. im of the younger generation, but my mom mentions lots of her friends using mushrooms in the early seventies, and they were not very far into the psychedelic scene at all. obviously you could get doses easier. i am sure people were taking psilocybin mushrooms in the sixties, but it was probably late sixties and it probably wasnt cubensis. even though the jefferson airplane makes mushroom references, it almost seems to be alluring to a more amanita-like trip in white rabbit. a couple of the grateful dead biographies i have read mention them taking mushrooms before the seventies--although they had unique access to psychedelics.

the real question for me is how many people smoked DMT back then? i have only heard of the dead and the pranksters.

EDIT: i think the electric kool aid acid test mentions someone smoking it at millbrook on the bus trip

 

[PriestTheyCalledHim]

How long have those countries starting using mushrooms tho? Since they read about them on the internet?

The Native Indians of those countries have been using them for thousands of years, just like they used tobacco in its raw form, morning glory seeds, psychedelic snuff/Yopo, and even Ayahuasca in some countries.

In many of those countries though, until pretty recent drug use even just smoking pot has pretty much been seen culturally as something lower class people do, or people in the slums of a major city would be into. Or if the people use psychedelics it is seen as something for only the indigenous native tribes people to use in a ritual.

There are religious cults in those countries based on psychedelic mushrooms, Ayahuasca, and San Pedro cactus but the majority of people in Latin American, Central American, and South American countries are Roman Catholic and do not get involved in the psychedelic cults or Afro-Brasilian or traditional native cults that use Ayahuasca.

I know people who are westerners who like to pretend they are "enlightened" because they go to the Amazon to take drugs in a psychedelic/cult Ayahuasca tourist ceremony but a lot of them have major mental illnesses and have other major issues that arise from the use/abuse of too many psychedelics. Terrence and Dennis McKenna, and Timothy Leary are examples of people like this.

 

[Toltec]

Yes we took shrooms in the Late 60's 70's! Thay grew in a certain park in San Francisco and alone the coastal areas... Only a few knew where they grew.. They where Psilocybin Cyanescens... We also experienced Mescaline via peyote... and very potent (Pure) LSD oh and I remember MDA was around...tooo

 

[my3rdeye]

I don't know whether I'd call it a boom. Even now - when the PF tek is a lot easier to follow than it was in 1976 - very few people can be bothered to grow their own shrooms.
-------

No way growing mushrooms changed the game. All the people taking mushrooms in 1969 were taking picked wild ones. I would venture very few mushrooms on the market today were picked. So yes some people did mushrooms in the 60s, and no it was not popular. Also Timothy Leary started the Psilocybin project in 1960 and they had synthetic psilocybin and probably gave it to everyone he could.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvard_Psilocybin_Project

 

[The Dr]

Love how people are still arguing about this.. Hippies did take fucking mushrooms, period. Everyone's getting so argumentative over a stupid topic with a clear answer. Love the one answer. YOU HAD TO GO ALL THE WAY TO MEXICO SO PEOPLE DIDN'T DO IT.
Oh shit, didn't know that if you had to go to another country to get a drug you wouldn't do it… hmm /grabs popcorn