Kmas
Bluelighter
- Joined
- Mar 15, 2025
- Messages
- 31
That's my point. There was no 'they'. The only person who remembered the 50 grams is Tim Scully, when he was 76 years old. Nearly 60 years after the fact. He had given numerous interviews when he was younger and never once mentioned the 50 gram sample. When it was closer to the events and he was sharper-minded. He tells different versions of the dosage and the sequence of events over the years. Nearly every time he's been interviewed. Early on his stories synched more with Stanley and Sands' versions. I believe this makes him an unreliable witness.
It doesn't necessary mean he's lying, although it's possible. It's been tested many times, how memories start to change as soon as an event occurs. Over time it becomes more and more distorted. It's certainly happened to me. I've been so convinced I've started yelling and insulting the person who was contradicting me with their own version. Then I was embarassed when it turned out I was wrong. This has a lot to do with how our brains simplify information to save space.
I was getting annoyed at that point because I'd invested so much time reading and re-reading, not just the article but other sources, finding more sources, writing and editing and deleting and re-writing my post. In the end I couldn't find any other references to the 50 grams. That's when I started getting a headache. I have a great deal of respect and admiration for Mathew Baggot, Paul F Daily and Keeper Trout and the researcha and work they are doing. They lend a geat deal of legitimacy to the conclusions of the articles and have access to Shulgin's files.
However they're not journalists. They have their own agenda. Building the legend, legacy, and fame of the 1st generation of psychedelic chemists, keeping them in the news and in the public's consciousness. They need interest and media attention to raise money to keep their labs open and to do the critically important research they are doing. Preserving The Farm and Shulgin's notes is a monumental undertaking and I know they're perpetually short on funds. The Farm should be a National Historical Landmark and Shulgin's Notes should be preserved as a part of the heritage of the American people. All of us should lend assistance to them one way or another if we are able.
This all has me wondering how critically they examined Scully's claims, especially compared to his statements in the past. I question why they weren't skeptical about the amount of DOM being enough for the boys to be distributing it on both coasts two months before the big party. Enough that some was seized by the DEA, Stanley was running tests in NY, there was quite a bit of it on the streets of San Francisco. Enough that an underground newspaper was writing about how the stuff was more potent and longer lasting over a month and a half before the solstice party. There's no way they would have enough left to dose as many people as they claimed they did and the records show.
The consequences for Sulgin if he was caught giving 50 grams of a substance basically belonging to DOW chemical should be explored. I don't believe Shulgin was that reckless. He would have lost everything. The Farm, his lab, his marriage, his feedom, his chemisty license. He would never work as a chemist again and would be sent to prison for spilling industrial secrets. DOW was contracted by the military. There was no reason to give them a sample anyway if they had notes to figure out the synthesis. No reason to take the risk.
I'll play the Devil's advocate, walk it back and say humans are all individuals. Despite all this there's a tiny possibility, I mean very tiny in my mind, that Shulgin did give Scully the sample. Humans are unpredictable and sometimes they don't need a reason to do something. Maybe everyone kept quiet to protect Shulgin's ass. It wasn't necessary after the books were published and especially not necessary after 2010 but still, nobody likes snitches.
Speaking of snitches there were certainly lots of them in the Bay Area in '66 and '67. The police were so out of touch with the people using the substances beatings and the threat of prison time. Along with payouts, using unlawful tactics, and grudges were the only real tool the police had for getting busts. Shulgin would have been very wary of Stanley's crew now that they were dipping their toes in law breaking. I believe he would have kept his contact to a minimum.
There is a claim in the articles that Shulgin and Stanley chose DOM because it was a substituted amphetamine. They thought it had potential to wean the speed freaks off meth. I don't find this likely, they couldn't be that naive. It's another oddball conclusion wrapped in the oddballness of the entire story. So oddball it may even be true.
An investgator could possibly get close to the truth even today. They'd have to have an open mind, clear it of bias. The 1st thing I'd investigate is other possible sources. Who attended Shulgin's public presentation. How public were Shulgin's records on synthesis, testing, etc. Quite a few people knew about the stuff at DOW and some of the other universities. Did Shulgin leave records at San Fran University, Berekley, John Hopkins, or any other institutions. Security was much more lax. There were counterculture folk had infiltrated all the major universities.
How did Shulgin know Stanley and the other chemists? When were they introduced. They didn't seem like good friends. Perhaps Stanley sent Shulgin a letter. Shulgin agrees that a legal source of psychedelics is needed. Writes him back. Go to University Y, department X. Talk to Glib Talkey, ask him about DOM. He'll set you up.
All it would take is a couple phone calls or a bit of mail corresponse. That's how Shulgin communicated, that's how everyone communicated then. All it would take is a few exchanges of letters between Shulgin and Scully or Owsley or a 3rd party and it's all set. I'm fairly certain that's what happened.
Then there's a conspiracy theory idea, that a collegue of Shulgin pretended to be Shulgin. Had access to DOM info and hooked the boys up. Seems plausible and there's no reason for the boys to think they hadn't dealt with Stanley. This mysterious collegue could have even sent Scully the DOM by mail, although I think that part of the story is less likely for reasons I've stated.
Stanley had a huge network of customers, workers, musicians, college students, friends, admirers, suppliers. Any of them could have been in the right place at the right time to learn about DOM and get a recipe to Stanley.
DOW and the FDA did an investigation and didnt' find Shulgin involved. Not that compelling but it's evidence. Shulgin had plenty of enemies in LEO, some at very high levels. I imagine some did digging of their own and came up short. More compelling but still not proof.
This is one of those mysteries, probably unsolveable like a lot of other 60s cultural events. When I was in high school a friend got into the jfk assassination. I got interested and dug through it. I don't want to debate that now, get into it, but now it's onorthodox to say that Oswald did it. The public overwhelmingly believes the conspiracy. Most don't know anything about it except that the government covered it up. It's culturally accepted as a fact.
Doing my own analysis I have to conclude it's most likely that Oswald was the killer. I know, back and to the left... The most interesting tidbit I've found out. That most people don't know. Is that the conspiracy theory was originally started in the mid 60s by the KGB to cause the US public to lose faith in it's government. I find this very interesting because of how well it worked. Before the JKF assassination Americans trusted their government. I believe the most likely conspiracist, if that's what it was, was the KGB.
It's possible Oswald acted alone on the orders of the KGB because they thought Kennedy was too unpredictable. Maybe that's what Oswald meant wen he called himself a 'patsy'. He certainly was 'helping' the commies. One thing that is a myth is that Kennedy was going to stop the Vietnam War. He was big on geographically isolating the communists and was already pouring gasoline on the fire. However maybe he would have taken LSD and stopped the Drug War? Were ifs and buts candy and nuts...
I wanted to post another Holy Modal Rounder song in the 'music' section. There were rounder posts, unfortunately all were 10 years old or older. Someone even posted 'Hippies call it STP' when Sasha Shulgin died. Cool. But there were no recent appropriate threads, I guess the old hippies that listened to folk music died off and tastes have changed.
So I'll post this song here because it's on topic with secrets, conspiracies, and the Novacops. A real favorite of mine. Funny, clever lyrics.
On the phenethylamine theme here's a song originally titled 'Intersoullular Blues'. The producers thought they'd be clever and call it 'The Radar Song', recorded 1967. For some reason these 'cool' turned on producers kept changing the names of rounder songs to 'The'. Followed by a noun. Then the word 'Song'. So the song the rounders named 'Do you want to be a bird' became 'the bird song'. 'Hippies call it stp' became 'the stp song'. The band hated it but by the time they noticed the records were already printed. That's what happens when you take LSD for a toothache or stay up for a week on meth instead of making sure the producers don't fuck up your album..
This song was written by the amazing freak folk musician Michael Hurley who died at the age of 84 (I think) a couple weeks ago. I attended a couple of his shows last year, they were fantastic despite his age. The story goes Hurley and a couple of future rounders (Robin Remaily and Steve Weber) when they were in their late teens around 1960, 61 maybe? Took a lot of mescaline and were singing and writing the song while walking though an old train tunnel in Phildelphia. At 2am. Hurley had recently broken up with a girlfriend and was considering shipping out with the Navy in the morning.
WARNING: it's a bad song unless you've tripped a lot in your life or you're tripping on mescaline or another powerful phenethylamine. Or maybe DiPT or certain other tryptamines. Then it's very interesting.
It's way, way ahead of it's time. No one else was experimenting with this kind of music. And not many with those kind of drugs yet. Even Shulgin was just getting started.
