From: [b--u--e] at [mindmedia.com] (Bruce e)
Newsgroups: alt.drugs
Subject: LSD Purity by Bruce Eisner
Date: Fri, 10 Nov 1995 17:01:05 GMT

If you enjoy the followng excerpt, the
complte text is at http://www.island.org.

LSD PURITY - CLEANLINESS IS NEXT TO GODLINESS 


                                   From High Times, January 1977
                                          By Bruce Eisner 

In the late 1940s, psychologists began experimenting with LSD as a
"psychotomimetic" drug - one that causes the taker
temporarily to mime the condition of psychosis. Some experimental
subjects, however, and eventually some modern mystics
like Aldous Huxley, Allen Ginsberg, and Alan Watts discovered in LSD a
shortcut to the ecstasy and egolessness of nirvana.
LSD was recognized as the switch that turned on the clear light of the
void. 

Today's acid trip, however, is far more likely to resemble a live TV
broadcast in runny color from the from seat of a roller
coaster or a scene from The Exorcist. The decline in psychedelic
quality over the years, which resembles the degeneration of
Christianity and Russian Communism, has been a consequence of greed
and opportunism on the part of manufactures and
distributors. They offer to substitute immediate sensory
gratifications for the original spiritual ideals. But the history of
underground chemistry is also one of ingenuity and courage though
influenced by haste and amateurishness. Its is the story of
how LSD-25, the most powerful and spiritual molecule known to humanity
became a "street drug." 

Originally all LSD was made by Sandoz Pharmaceutical company, which
had developed the chemical and hoped to market it
commercially. It came in glass ampules filled with blue liquid, or
small tablets in bottles with pharmaceutical labels specifying
strength. 

With underground LSD use came underground manufacture. The first
recorded underground laboratory was set up by
Bernard Roseman in 1962. Roseman, who now lives in seclusion in
Oregon, was later arrested for allegedly attempting to
smuggle 62,000 doses of LSD. In his LSD and the Age of the Mind, he
has this account of the first manufacture of LSD of
less than pharmaceutical quality: 

     I have already invested a year - on and off - and all the money I
could save on this project, and I was at the point
     of admitting defeat. At this time, I was naturally reading
everything I could lay my hands upon about ergot
     alkaloids. I stumbled upon a few articles that at first seemed
quite unrelated to LSD, but they were logical and
     worth a try; because by comparison the process was exceedingly
simple, compared to Hoffmann's monumental
     preparation. 

     I obtained new starting material and worked it up to the point I
was sure was correct, where I had d-lysergic acid
     monohydrate, quite useless by itself but the prerequisite for
making LSD-25 by any system. The rest of my
     ordered materials arrived and I was ready to proceed. After so
many repeated failures, I couldn't accept the
     possibility that this few-day procedure would work. 

     I went ahead nevertheless, though pessimistically, so that my
seemingly apparent failure would not bother me too
     much. I worked with extreme care, protecting anything from heat
and light. At the last step, when I was
     recrystallizing the few grams I had obtained, I was filtering the
crystals off by vacuum and using ether. When all
     the ether evaporated , the substance started to absorb moisture
from the atmosphere and was turning black
     before my eyes. All my work was gone: I stood there shocked
unable to move for a moment. My hands
     instinctively grabbed an alcohol bottle and I pored it over the
black decomposed material hoping to salvage
     something. I separated it with water and disheartedly took the
black mess home. All night I tossed and turned
     and dreamt horrible, unrelated dreams. 

     At the first crack of dawn, I jumped out of bed, grabbed the
flask from the refrigerator, poured a teaspoonful and
     drank it down. I went back to bed and turned on Wagner's
Parsifal. Minutes passed by and nothing seemed to
     happen. I had psychologically prepared myself for failure, so I
just closed my eyes and lay back an listened to the
     wonderful sounds of Wagner. In my concentration, I failed to
notice that the music was getting slowly louder and
     instead of just my ears hearing, all my senses seemed to
encompass the sound., and instead of hearing the music -
     I was the music! 

     Beautiful, soft colors emerged and exploded as climates of tone
were achieved. An immediate understanding of
     the composer's intentions was revealed to me; I was being taken
on a heavenly excursion into the world of pure
     sound and emotion. All at once, I sprang up with joy. I was in
the state of LSD - my own LSD which I had
     made. I was deliriously happy and proud of my success. 

LSD is a translucent crystal; this was a black mess. Thus, the first
underground LSD was also the first impure batch, and its
distribution may, somewhere, have incurred the first unfavorable
consumer reaction. 

By 1965, use had increased sharply. Most acid at this time came in
sugar cubes dropped with liquid Sandoz or some type of
underground LSD. What percentage of the material was Sandoz is left to
future determination. Augustus Stanley Owsley III,
unable to obtain any pharmaceutical LSD, began to manufacture his own
- first in Los Angeles in '65, then in nearby Point
Richmond in '66. 

Owsley's fellow alchemist, Tim Scully, admitted to me that the 1965
batch was impure, but claims that Owsley and he
perfected a purification process in 1966. Many who used both Sandoz
and Owsley - the latter came in tablets of purple
(Purple Haze) and white (White Lightning) of 270 micrograms - say that
Owsley acid was less mystical and had more stimulant
side reactions than the Sandoz product. 

Timothy Leary, who realized that impurities were a threat to the
spreading psychedelic revolution, uttered prophetic words of
warning at a Senate committee hearing in 1966, in exchange with Teddy
Kennedy: 

     Senator Kennedy of Massachusetts: "What is it in the quality that
you are frightened about?" 

     Dr. Leary: "We do not want amateur or black-market sale or
distribution of LSD." 

     Senator Kennedy: "Why not?" 

     Dr. Leary: "Or the barbiturates or liquor. When you buy a bottle
of liquor-" 

     Senator Kennedy: "This is not responsive. As to LSD, why do you
not want it?" 

     Dr. Leary: "On possession?" 

     Senator Kennedy: "Why do you not want the indiscriminate
manufacture and distribution? Is it because it is
     dangerous?" 

     Dr. Leary: "Because you do not know what you are getting..." 

Despite Leary's warning, LSD was made illegal on October 16, 1966. 

continued at http://www.island.org