(Michael Aldrich is co-director of Amorphia, Inc. and the editor of Marijuana Review. The following article is copyright (c) Marijuana Review 1972.)

The rumor has resounded since October, 1967, when the Boston underground paper Avatar announced: “A major tobacco company has registered as trade marks the names Panama Red, Brazilian Black, and Acapulco Gold. The rumor is that the ffist reefers will be mentholated to ease the harshness oh the throat for those turning on for the first time. On the other hand, the tobacco companies may well lose out when pot is legalized. All those bars, after all, will have facilities awaiting the trade. So look for Schenley’s announcement that it is bottling bhang.”

We at SUNY-Buffalp checked it out immediately at the U.S. Patent Office and discovered it was not true: though several individuals had tried, no one had been granted the trademarks, because in order to register the product names, an applicant is required to market the product immediately – and no one was able to market dope legally. We continued to investigate every few months, and even wrote the major tobacco companies to inquire as their intentions. The response ffpm R.J. Reynolds was typical: