Image from public domain.

By coincidence, the first issue of my my law firm’s new High Times subscription arrived on April 14, just six days shy of 4/20/2010,

Flashing back to 1990, I first took out a subscription to High Times magazine in protest over a Louisiana federal prosecutor’s subpoenaing the magazine’s advertiser records — as reported by Index on Censorship — in an apparent effort to clamp down on hydroponic sellers and customers, and various other suspected marijuana-related vendors.  I wrote to then-attorney general Dick Thornburgh about my protest, and cc’d it to High Times; I received a reply from neither. I read each issue, and perhaps the most beneficial article was the one on then-NORML national director Don Fiedler, whom I discuss here.

Granted, High Times has many ads that one might expect instead to find in a Victoria’s Secret catalogue. On the other hand, since I frequently defend marijuana, the magazine has its benefits. On top of that, Cheech and Chong are in the current cover article.

Tom Forcade started High Times in 1974. Four years later, he took his own life. He was a very colorful person, to say the least.