Actually, I entered the folk scene in the early Fifties before there was much of a folk scene, and I watched the whole thing develop from the very few of us who were interested in folk music before it was "the thing to do," on into the Sixties and Seventies and beyond. If you read my initial post, you'll note that I say that pot didn't make itself really evident until the mid-Sixties. From that point on, I saw plenty of it. But it was mostly people who had come into it within the past year or two and who regarded the Kingston Trio and the New Christy Minstrels were source singers. Some stuck with folk music after the "Folk Scare" faded, and many others either dropped out or went on to rock.. There was a lot of pot and other drugs there. In fact, I had a couple of friends who "graduated" from folk music to rock who very soon killed themselves with overdoses of the hard stuff. Damned tragic!

But among those I know who stuck with folk music, and most of the newcomers (since the Seventies), pot, if it is there at all, is very peripheral. Yes, I do see an occasional person wander off, then return a bit later. And I know they're smoking because they come back with tobacco on their breath—and yes, I do know the difference. I'm not saying that an occasion joint doesn't get consumed, but at least where I have been in recent decades, it's pretty rare and very discrete. And I can't see how anyone can reasonably claim that there is any more association between folk music and pot than there is between, say, ballroom dancing and pot. I'm quite sure a few ballroom dancers smoke pot. But an occasional Baptist minister does, too.

And as far as folk music being part of the Beat Culture, that just wasn't so—except in the minds of the general public. People who regarded themselves a Beats had a real antipathy toward folk singers. Believe me, I was there!

I'm not making any moral judgments about pot. I personally chose not to indulge. If anybody else wants to, feel free.

Don Firth