Mary Jane Rathbun

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Mary Jane Rathbun (born December 22, 1922 in Minnesota , † April 10, 1999 in San Francisco , Northern California), called Brownie Mary, was an American hemp activist.

Life

Mary Jane Rathbun was born in Minnesota on December 22, 1922 and later moved to Chicago with her parents. Her Irish Catholic mother named her Mary Jane, a name that is a euphemism for marijuana that her mother was not aware of.

While still in her teens, Mary Jane Rathbun traveled with a group of activists from Chicago to Wisconsin to protest for union rights for miners. As early as 1947 she was promoting the right to abortion on the streets of Minneapolis.

She and three friends moved to San Francisco in the early days of World War II because they were all about to marry servicemen.

She actually met a soldier she married, but the divorce quickly resulted. Their only child from this marriage, a daughter named Jenny, died in a car accident at the age of 22.

Marijuana Activism and Achievements

In the 1970s, she began selling cannabis-containing “ magic brownies ” to passers-by for $ 2 or $ 4 apiece.

Conflict with the law

Mary Jane Rathbun was first taken into custody in 1982 in San Francisco for marijuana possession. In this context, a judge ordered that she had to do 500 hours of community service, which she did with the Shanti project , the first aid to AIDS.

When confronted with the city's homosexual AIDS crisis, she began giving her brownies to the sick for symptom relief.

From the mid-1980s to around 1990, she received so many inquiries about Mariuhanna brownies from sick people that she had to pull names out of a cookie jar to decide who would receive them.

In 1992, Mary Jane Rathbun gained national attention when she was arrested by Sonoma County, Cazadero police while stirring 2.5 pounds of marijuana into her cake batter.

However, the charges were dropped several months later after Sonoma Countys prosecutor said the trial of a "cake-making grandmother" would spark a media circus.

Commitment to the legalization of medicinal hemp

By the 1980s, Rathbun had become an outspoken advocate of legalizing hemp as a medicinal product , firmly believing that cannabis could relieve AIDS patients' pain and increase their appetite.

She was instrumental in the adoption of California Proposition P and California Proposition 215 , referendums that wrote the impunity of medicinal cannabis users in California law.

death

Mary Jane Rathbun died on April 10, 1999 after a long illness at the age of 77 in the hospice and palliative care unit of Laguna Honda Hospital in San Francisco.

In August 1998 she had a fall and had to undergo neck and spine surgery.

In addition, she suffered from age-related arthritis, and in the last few months of her life had considerable pain and restricted mobility that confined her to a bed and wheelchair.

Publications

  • Claire Burch: California Chronicles of Medical Marijuana . DVD. Regent Press, 2007.
  • Mary Rathbun, Dennis Peron: Brownie Mary's Marijuana Cookbook and Dennis Peron's Recipe for Social Change . Trail of Smoke Publishing, 1996, ISBN 0-9639892-0-0 .
  • Mary Rathbun: 50th Anniversary of LSD: Marijuana and Medical Uses; Sacred and Healing Plants and Psychedelic Drugs in the Treatment of Substance Abuse. San Francisco Unitarian Center, April 17, 1993.

See also

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g Mary Jane Rathbun, Popularly Known As Brownie Mary. JL Pimsleur Published 4:00 am, Tuesday April 13, 1999. SF Gate, April 13, 1999, accessed December 23, 2015 .
  2. ↑ a b c d e 'Brownie Mary' Rathbun Dies; Advocated Medical Marijuana. In: LA Times. April 13, 1999, accessed December 23, 2015 .
  3. ↑ 10 Historic Heroes of Marijuana Legalization. In: Paper (magazine). May 29, 2014, accessed December 29, 2015 .
personal data
SURNAME Rathbun, Mary Jane
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Brownie Mary (pseudonym)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American hemp activist
DATE OF BIRTH December 22, 1922
PLACE OF BIRTH Minnesota
DATE OF DEATH April 10, 1999
Place of death San Francisco