| Am I Alone in This? Bill Bottrell in the January 2001 New Settler |
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I discovered how important marijuana is in this county. My belief is it is the post-lumber industry of this county, driving the economy here. In thirty years, employment in the timber industry went from 37% of the population to 07%. Some of those sons got absorbed into some other economy because they're still here. And they're not the ones who became waiters. BILL: The anecdotes just kept coming at me. And I saw what had happened to the town of Mendocino over the past 20 years. And I had this idea that Mendocino should have a harvest festival every October, and the likes of you - the historians - should document what went on here, and how the bed and breakfasts were funded and built. How everything we see around us was funded. This new culture - new since the seventies - was built on marijuana |
and why deny it? It needs to be celebrated for the industry it is. I remember in the 1970s, every small business that went to the bank and was turned down found somebody in the marijuana industry to be their investor: Everywhere: Willits, Laytonville, Garberville, Redway, even Ukiah. The health centers, the community centers, two radio stations were built with the sweat equity the industry made available as well as the monies tithed. BILL: It creates a pirate culture - because it is illegal - that I find very intriguing. And it creates a hardy, individualist population.
Well the growers on the ridges
are such a different breed/
but down in San Jose they say, 'Oh that killer weed!' |