What About Hemp

[Chuck]

When I say Hemp most people will associate it as a drug and think of Marijuana. This is simply not true. Yes it has some of the characteristics of marijuana and does have a very low level of THC, the substance that makes marijuana a drug. The levels of THC are not enough to make it usable as a drug even in large amounts.

With our drug problem, and if Hemp had a value as a drug, we have a massive wild crop of Hemp that have not been touched. I would find that as odd.

Hemp was a large cash crop for Maysville-Mason County up till 1937 when it was made illegal by federal law to grow.

The truth is that Hemp is still a large cash crop in many Countries including Canada. The products made by hemp to name only a few are Rope, Oils and YES even food.

Truth be know we blindly use Hemp in products sold here in the USA that are made from Hemp.

In 2001 Virginia legalized the growing of Hemp based on these simple fact for their farmers. However due to federal laws not a single plant has been grown.

Gov. Jones was working to legalize the growth of Hemp for farmers as an alternative crop for Kentucky farmers before he went out of office. Work on Hemp was stopped after he left. Gambling is the new focus.

I don't have all the answers or facts but I do feel it is a pliable option that needs heavy research. It is a crop that could help our County's economical growth.

[kcredden]

As you may have recalled from the questions I asked on the chat line with Mr. Boggs about Hemp, I totally agree with you on this. Hemp has my support, but Marijuana doesn't. As usual, the goverement in their infinite stupidity screws up big-time.

But the solution may be for scientest to re-engineer the hemp plant so it looks different from MJ. I'm sure they can do it, IF enough money was given to this.

[grins] Money coming from hemp? That'd be a twist.

[thetalady4]

you might want to check the historical marker at the college.....stood for years on route8 as you drove down west second street....have no idea when or why it was moved.....

[Foxy]

I think that it should be allowed to be grown. I use an awesome after tanning lotion that has the main ingredient of hemp. I have many hemp rope necklaces, and bed sheets.
I see no problem. As far as drug users, that analogy might be as good as them saying Oregano is MJ crushed up... hmmm

[tkcomer]

I think the farmers should be allowed to grow it if they want. Seems like I heard that it is actually more labor intensive than tobacco. I wonder how much you could make off an acre of the stuff? That is the determining factor if it gets planted, provided it is legalized.

[Chuck]

Hemp is lower maintenance than tobacco and has 120 day grow cycle. You cut it with what looks like a combine and roll it like hay.

I can only judge based on the pictures I have seen and the articles I have read.

[tkcomer]

Wow, things have changed. I was thinking that you had to cut it by hand and strip the leaves off of it as the stalk and the big limbs were all they wanted. For rope production that is. Or anything that used the fibers. I keep thinking the per acre profit was kinda low. But I was also thinking of fiber production, not the whole thing.

[ponto]

August 13, 1941, Henry Ford first displayed his plastic car at Dearborn Days in Michigan.

The car ran on fuels derived from hemp and other agricultural based sources, and the fenders were made of hemp, wheat, straw, and synthetic plastics.

Ford said his vision was "to grow automobiles from the soil."

http://www.kentuckyhemp.com/

[DecupldSolutions]

To make a long story short, during the first decades of this century, opium was made illegal to kick out the Chinese immigrants who had flooded the work-force. Cocaine was made illegal to repress and control the Black community. And, marijuana was made illegal in order to control Mexicans in the Southeast (and Blacks.) All these laws were based mainly on emotional racism, without much else to back them up -- you can easily tell this by reading the hearings held in state legislatures. Also at this time, the end of Prohibition left us with a large force of unemployed police officers, who looked for work enforcing the new drug laws. Consequently, these same police officers needed to convince the country that their jobs were important. They did so by scaring parents about the dangers of drugs. All this set the stage for a law passed in the Federal legislature which put a prohibitive tax on marijuana. This is what killed the hemp industry in 1937, since it made business in hemp impossible.

DuPont among others had a heavy influence in getting the policy where it is today. Not to mention the aims of short term political gain to be had at the time by making this, among other things, illegal, for whatever reasons.

http://www.cannabis.com/faqs/hemp2.shtml

No problem here. In either side of it.

http://economics.about.com/od/incometaxestaxcuts/a/legalize_pot.htm

Oh and hemp is cannabis. There are different strains producing more or less thc, but they all produce hemp fiber. Industrial hemp is traditionally bred for fiber production and does not hold a lot of the active ingredient, but they are the same genus, species and phylum.

http://www.maysvillekybbs.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=1220&d=1149117705

[DecupldSolutions]

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[lone wolf]

My grandfather raised hemp and I have a few pictures showing him and some of his brothers in the fields. One that stands out most is showing him on the back of a flat bed truck and the top of the hemp plant is still over his head. I've heard of several sites in Mason county that you can still find hemp plants growing wild, associated with old growing sites from years gone by.

Isn't it odd, how life appears more and more like a circle. Ever heard the old saying about how history repeats itself? How trends seem to go out of style and then return years later. How each generation seems to take credit for finding or designing something new, but in fact it was created by another generation.

There is a lot of plants that can help the people of this planet, that our great grandparent's and grandparent's knew about. But were tossed aside due to narrow minded people, our government and large companies. How do you regulate something that nature provides you free of charge? You brand it evil, a menace and a threat to the family structure. Gosh, I remember "Rock N' Roll" was labeled that too.

[tkcomer]

After some digging around, it looks like a person can produce about 2 to 3.5 tons an acre. But I can’t find what a ton or pound is worth. Lots of stuff made from hemp. Some seems quite reasonable, some seems quite expensive. I’m still not sure that there is much profit in it. And there is still that chicken and egg catch. No production, no manufacturers. I guess we could bulk ship it to China. They’ll make something out of it for us.

[kdown]

Currently seven states (Hawaii, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Montana, North Dakota and West Virginia) have passed pro-hemp farming laws. Sales of hemp foods in 2004/2005 grew by 50% over the previous 12-month period. U.S. retail sales of hemp products are estimated to now be $250 to $300 million per year. There are more than 2.5 million cars on U.S. roads that contain hemp composites. Hemp cultivation in Canada is expected to exceed 50,000 acres in 2006, while European farmers now grow more than 40,000 acres.

[ponto]

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Location: 5 mi. W. of Winchester, US 60

Description: One of the ten Bluegrass counties which produced over 90 percent of the entire country's yield in late 1800s. Production increased from 155 tons in 1869 to over 1,000 tons in 1889, valued at about $125 per ton. In 1942, Winchester selected as site of one of 42 cordage plants built throughout country to offset fiber shortage during war. See over.

(Reverse) Hemp in Kentucky - First crop grown, 1775. From 1840 to 1860, Ky.'s production largest in U.S. Peak in 1850 was 40,000 tons, with value of $5,000,000. Scores of factories made twine, rope, oakum to caulk sailing ships and cotton bagging. State's largest cash crop until 1915. Market lost to imported jute, freed of tariff. As war measure, hemp grown again during World War II. See over.

you might want to check the historical marker at the college.....stood for years on route8 as you drove down west second street....have no idea when or why it was moved.....


Hemp in Mason County
(Marker Number: 1165)

County: Mason
Location: Near entrance to Maysville Community College, US 68

Description: The only major hemp-producing Ky. county outside the Blue Grass area. The 1810 crop income was $70,000. Maysville second to Louisville in finished hemp products, 1830s. Nicholas Arthur's factory, using horsepower, was one of several ropewalks, long buildings for spiral winding of hemp fibers. It processed yearly 600,000 lbs. of rope worth $41,000. See over.

(Reverse) Hemp in Kentucky - First crop grown, 1775. From 1840 to 1860, Ky.'s production largest in U.S. Peak in 1850 was 40,000 tons, with value of $5,000,000. Scores of factories made twine, rope, gunny sacks, bags for cotton picking and marketing. State's largest cash crop until 1915. Market lost to imported jute, freed of tariff. As war measure, hemp grown again during World War II. See over.

[kdown]

January and Wood made rope out of it in those days.

[lone wolf]

I've heard that hemp can be used in not only making rope, it's most common use, but also in the making of food products, insulation, clothing and paper. We loose enough trees as it is to make room for the growing population, why not consider saving a few more by replacing their fiber with that of hemp for the production of paper products? Every little bit helps.

[Chuck]

I've heard that hemp can be used in not only making rope, it's most common use, but also in the making of food products, insulation, clothing and paper. We loose enough trees as it is to make room for the growing population, why not consider saving a few more by replacing their fiber with that of hemp for the production of paper products? Every little bit helps.


I been saving this but the U.S. Constitution was written on Paper that was made from Hemp.