{"id":7792,"date":"2017-10-15T06:34:50","date_gmt":"2017-10-15T06:34:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.denverpost.com\/?p=2800178"},"modified":"2017-10-15T06:34:50","modified_gmt":"2017-10-15T06:34:50","slug":"prohibitionist-post-125-years-covering-colorados-love-hate-affair-with-alcohol-and-cannabis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/prohibitionist-post-125-years-covering-colorados-love-hate-affair-with-alcohol-and-cannabis\/","title":{"rendered":"Prohibitionist Post: 125 years covering Colorado\u2019s love-hate affair with alcohol and cannabis"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"wp_fb_like_button\" style=\"margin:5px 0 5px 5px;float:right;height:100px;\"><script src=\"http:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/all.js#xfbml=1\"><\/script><fb:like href=\"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/prohibitionist-post-125-years-covering-colorados-love-hate-affair-with-alcohol-and-cannabis\/\" send=\"true\" layout=\"standard\" width=\"450\" show_faces=\"false\" font=\"arial\" action=\"like\" colorscheme=\"light\"><\/fb:like><\/div><div class=\"media_block\"><\/div>\n<p>Denver has long been a premier spot for getting wasted.<\/p>\n<p>Back in 1859, the Denver City was founded when land speculators led by Gen. William Larimer persuaded a competing mining claim to surrender its rights with a barrel of whiskey. The first city government was subsequently formed in a saloon. Over the next decades, a silver boom \u2013 and the arrival of the railroad \u2013 transformed the town into a frontier watering hole as prospectors and immigrants flocked to the foot of the Rocky Mountains to soak in sorrows and toast good fortune.<\/p>\n<p>By the turn of the 20th century, the city\u2019s unruly reputation thrust the nascent state of Colorado into a love-hate relationship with prohibition that is still being realized to this day. And for nearly every step, The Denver Post has been there to cover the complicated affair.<\/p>\n<p>As the state rounded the bend into the 20th century, the temperance movement was well under way in the West, frothing up fear of a liquor-fueled uprising by European-immigrant miners. The zeitgeist was summarized in a September 1914 Post story on a gathering of Denver\u2019s People\u2019s Tabernackle. During the rally, William A. \u201cBilly\u201d Sunday called for a ban on alcohol and railed against the city\u2019s \u201cwhiskey-soaked, foul-mouthed, vermin covered, pug-gut, hog-jowled, weasel-eyed\u201d drinkers.<\/p>\n<p>Less than two months later, Coloradans voted for prohibition. When the law went into effect Jan. 1, 1916, The Post was there to set the mood: \u201cDenver Drinks Health of New Year in Lemonade as Joy Liquids Vanish.\u201d Deeper in the paper, follow-up stories reported, \u201cDisorder and trouble fail to materialize in Larimer Street\u201d and \u201cRevelers fill cafes and try hard to be real devilish.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Colorado\u2019s prohibition \u2013 enacted more than four years before national Prohibition would take hold \u2013 shuttered about 1,500 saloons and 500 hotels and restaurants, according to Post legend Dick Kreck\u2019s July 2009 opus, \u201cHigh, dry times as Prohibition era sobered Denver.\u201d The first drunk arrested New Year\u2019s Day, Kreck found, was a point of contention between The Post and competitor Rocky Mountain News. While The Post reported 49-year-old laborer John Hanson was the first, the News gave the honor to 38-year-old farmer Charles Robbins.<\/p>\n<p>Prohibition had the full-throated support of The Post, but the paper didn\u2019t dilute coverage of its effects \u2013 thousands of residents living in open rebellion of state and federal authority.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_2820786\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone size-article_inline\"><img class=\" lazyautosizes lazyload\" src=\"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/prohibitionist-post-125-years-covering-colorados-love-hate-affair-with-alcohol-and-cannabis\" alt=\"A Gangland Bomb Plot leveled the north Denver home of bootlegger Pete Carlino some months before the gang leader was shot to death. The historic photo from shows the ruins.\" width=\"3000\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">\n<p>The Denver Post<\/p>\n<p>A Gangland Bomb Plot leveled the north Denver home of bootlegger Pete Carlino some months before the gang leader was shot to death. The historic photo from shows the ruins.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>The Post covered smuggling with gusto. In February 1916, the paper reported that up to $3,500 worth of beer and liquors were flowing into Colorado from Wyoming each month. A month later, a piece reported on the confiscation of cider shipped to 11 Denver merchants by the Los Angeles Fruit Products Company of St. Louis. In January \u2013 as the state was preparing to ratify federal Prohibition \u2013 a front-page story outlined a spoiled plot to smuggle thousands of pints of whiskey into Denver disguised as olive oil.<\/p>\n<p>Reporting on Coloradans\u2019 imaginative, if not dangerous and unsanitary, distilling operations also sold papers. In February 1920, a Post headline warned: \u201cSulphuric Acid and Water are Sold as Whiskey to Denver Clubmen and Alleged Bootleggers are Jailed.\u201d It went on to describe booze that \u201csmokes like a cigar.\u201d In October 1921, The Post discovered dead rodents inside liquor stills run at local dairy. A January 1922 story described, with some admiration, a still that a Denver mechanic built out of old gas tanks and exhaust pipes.<\/p>\n<p>By 1925, The Post could tell which way the wind was blowing, Kreck reported. In an editorial calling for a national referendum on the issue, the paper declared: \u201cThe longer Prohibition goes the more apparent it becomes that no law ever passed in this country has been so flouted and treated with contempt and contumely. \u2026 We ought to get honest about booze again.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Colorado ratified the 21st Amendment repealing Prohibition on Sept. 26, 1933. The Post\u2019s story was succinct \u2013 just barely above the fold \u2013 and observed: \u201cWets\u2019 new responsibility accented.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_2820784\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone size-article_inline\"><img class=\" lazyautosizes lazyload\" src=\"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/prohibitionist-post-125-years-covering-colorados-love-hate-affair-with-alcohol-and-cannabis-1\" alt=\"Foreman John Strausheim, right, points to a tunnel leading into a secret basement room fully equipped as a bootleg whiskey plant in June 1954. Broken wooden barrels, layers of debris, water and gas lines, a gas stove and The Denver Post for Aug. 27, 1933, were found in the room, which was uncovered by workmen razing a building at 2033 Champa St.\" width=\"2632\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">\n<p>Cloyd Teter, The Denver Post<\/p>\n<p>Foreman John Strausheim, right, points to a tunnel leading into a secret basement room fully equipped as a bootleg whiskey plant in June 1954. Broken wooden barrels, layers of debris, water and gas lines, a gas stove and The Denver Post for Aug. 27, 1933, were found in the room, which was uncovered by workmen razing a building at 2033 Champa St.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Was The Post predicting a future wherein a Colorado governor who made his fame and fortune as a beer brewer would preside over the end of marijuana prohibition?<\/p>\n<p>Alcohol prohibition was dubbed \u201cThe Noble Experiment,\u201d and current Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper has been quoted in The Post describing marijuana legalization as \u201cA Great Experiment.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>But Colorado was a laboratory for regulating marijuana a full 95 years before Colorado voters legalized recreational marijuana with the passage of Amendment 64. A 1917 measure making the growing and selling of the plant a misdemeanor doesn\u2019t appear to have garnered major coverage. However, with alcohol banned, marijuana \u2013 n\u00e9e marihuana \u2013 and the Mexican immigrants blamed for it sparked hysteria throughout the American West, and Post reporting fanned the fire.<\/p>\n<p>In April 1929, the gruesome murder of a white child by her Mexican stepfather gripped the pages of The Post: \u201cFather Beats Child to Death With Poker,\u201d \u201cPosses Hunt Man Who Beat Child to Death,\u201d \u201cFiend Slayer Caught in Nebraska; Mexican Confess Torture of American Baby.\u201d The subhead to that story read: \u201cPrisoner Admits to Officer He Is Marijuana Addict.\u201d The Colorado Assembly didn\u2019t wait for a trial to act \u2014 by the end of the 1929 legislative session, the body had passed and the governor signed a bill making repeat marijuana offenses a felony.<\/p>\n<p>The feds caught up to Colorado in 1937 when the Marihuana Tax Act went into effect Oct. 1. Days later, Denver resident Samuel Caldwell was the first person arrested for a federal marijuana charge. Under the slug \u201cCRIME NEVER PAYS,\u201d the lede in The Post\u2019s Oct. 8, 1937, story declared: \u201cThe government proved Friday it means business in its drive against the peddlers and users of marijuana.\u201d<\/p>\n<aside class=\"related right\" \/>\n<p>More illuminating to the racist, sensationalist coverage of marijuana common during the day, however, was a subsequent story, \u201cArrest of Four Aliens Reveals Denver Marijuana Sales Ring,\u201d which reported that it took four officers to subdue stoned suspect Juan Moya, who managed to eat most of his stash in the process.<\/p>\n<p>It was among a slew of Post stories that would fill the infamous \u201cGore Files\u201d of Federal Bureau of Narcotics chief Harry J. Anslinger, the man who led cannabis prohibition at the national level until 1962.<\/p>\n<p>Is the journalistic past prologue?<\/p>\n<p>The Post prohibitionist predilections put it on the wrong side of Colorado\u2019s major voter-led legalization efforts, 2000\u2019s Amendment 20 legalizing medical marijuana and 2012\u2019s Amendment 64 legalizing the sale of recreational marijuana.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_2820856\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone size-article_inline\"><img class=\" lazyautosizes lazyload\" src=\"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/prohibitionist-post-225-years-covering-colorados-love-hate-affair-with-alcohol-and-cannabis-2\" alt=\"A cloud of smoke covers the crowd at 4:20 p.m. at the Annual Denver 420 Rally in Civic Center Park April 20, 2012.\" width=\"4256\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">\n<p>Joe Amon, The Denver Post<\/p>\n<p>A cloud of smoke covers the crowd at 4:20 p.m. at the Annual Denver 420 Rally in Civic Center Park April 20, 2012.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>\u201cWe think the risks are not worth the potential benefits,\u201d an <a href=\"http:\/\/www.denverpost.com\/2012\/10\/12\/editorial-amendment-64-is-the-wrong-way-to-legalize-marijuana\/\">Oct. 12, 2012, editorial<\/a> said of Amendment 64. \u201cIf Colorado becomes an island with legal marijuana, what\u2019s to prevent it from also becoming a magnet nationally for marijuana users, growers and distributors?\u201d With sales of cannabis in Colorado topping $1.3 billion in 2016, it appears the answer \u2013 short of federal legalization \u2014 is nothing.<\/p>\n<p>Denver was on the cusp of legalization in December 2013 when the paper launched <a href=\"http:\/\/www.thecannabist.co\/\">The Cannabist<\/a>, its most ambitious digital \u2013 and perhaps journalistic \u2013 venture to date. In a matter of three years, founding editor Ricardo Baca grew the website into an influential, multichannel national news and lifestyle website on the vanguard of #AllThingsWeed.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe weren\u2019t really the first, but I think we were the first to throw these kinds of resources and approach it from a perspective of journalism, not activism,\u201d he told the Poynter Institute\u2019s Benjamin Mullin.<\/p>\n<p>The Post has also moved to get its piece of the pot pie, having recently wrapped a Sunday issue in an advertisement for a cannabis company; the industry now advertises regularly on The Cannabist.<\/p>\n<p>But some things never change: Cannabis remains federally illegal \u2013 now under the guise of the Controlled Substances Act of 1970, which counts marijuana as a substance as dangerous as heroin and LSD, and the Drug Enforcement Agency still spells it \u201cmarihuana.\u201d Law enforcement authorities also continue to cite The Post\u2019s reporting in efforts to fortify national prohibition. In a May 1 letter to congressional leaders, U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions requested renewed authority to crack down on medical marijuana in states that have legalized it, citing The Post\u2019s March coverage of a massive black-market bust in which half the suspects had state-issued licenses to grow the plant.<\/p>\n<p>The attorney general has yet to cite in writing The Post\u2019s 2015 <a href=\"http:\/\/extras.denverpost.com\/stateofhope\/index.html\">Pulitzer Prize finalist, \u201cDesperate Journey,\u201d<\/a> which followed the plight of a North Carolina family who moved to Colorado in order to treat a sick child with cannabidiol, a cannabis compound touted for its medicinal promise.<\/p>\n<p>Nearly four full years into the post-prohibition era, cannabis is a commodity unlike any the state has seen before. It is simultaneously life-saving medicine to some and the life of the party, a spiritual sacrament and an economic engine to others. The Post\u2019s coverage of the first day of legal recreational marijuana sales in the state foreshadowed that future. The first Coloradan to make a purchase on Jan. 1, 2014, Post staff writer John Ingold reported, was 32-year-old Iraq war veteran Sean Azzariti. He told the paper he used cannabis to alleviate symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder.<\/p>\n<p>What does it all portend for the next century of Post journalism? The ever-shifting landscape of legal cannabis makes it hard to plan the upcoming week\u2019s coverage, let alone predict how Colorado\u2019s experiment will unfold. As The Post\u2019s coverage of Colorado\u2019s complicated affair with prohibition shows, the paper will be a critical variable in the laboratory as the state continues with one of the greatest experiments American democracy has known.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"media_block\"><\/div>\n<p>By the turn of the 20th century, the city\u2019s unruly reputation thrust the nascent state of Colorado into a love-hate relationship with prohibition that is still being realized to this day. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5062,6811,7351,6813,77,9,5019,1,3,526,7352,61,1736],"tags":[5063,6816,7353,6818,2655,5022,3100,7354],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7792"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7792"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7792\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7792"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7792"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7792"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}