Mind Over Matter

Tobacco is one of the 18th-20th centuries biggest boom when it comes to legalized drugs. The British thought of tobacco as the poor man’s drug, the spread of tobacco in the western colonies led to America's backbone wealth which led to them having the courage for revolution.It is proposed that the sale of tobacco in the American colonies is how the US made its wealth to get where it is today.

In Iain Gately's book, Tobacco: A Cultural History of How an Exotic Plant Seduced Civilization; he goes into detail about the earliest signs of tobacco and what it was used for. The nomads and settlers in this area, studied the herbs that grew there and tobacco was one plants they had never seen before. 

"Both Nicotiana rustica and Nicotiana tabacum are native only to the Americas, where mankind came across them about 18,000 years ago." 5

5. Gately, Iain. (2007) 2007. Tobacco. Grove Atlantic. https://www.perlego.com/book/2431040/tobacco-a-cultural-history-of-how-an-exotic-plant-seduced-civilization-pdf.

The multifaceted medicinal drug was said to have originated from the Americas, brought to Europe through colonizers like Christopher Columbus. It is now produced in China, India, Brazil, USA and Indonesia. Native Americans used tobacco for ceremonial purposes and en-justed by either smoking, chewing, and sniffing it up the nose. The Native Americans also used tobacco for soical and lesiure activities the negative cognitation was put upon that all Native Americans do is smoke tobacco and live uncivilzied. Tobacco slowly became accepted into European society whereas old fads like hemp seed and lavender quickly died out. 6

6 A. Belshis and R. Dick. The North British intelligencer; or, Constitutional
miscellany;. Vol. 3. [Edinburgh, Scotland ]: [s.n., 1776- ], [Edinburgh,
Scotland : s.n., 1776- ]. Eighteenth Century Collections Online (accessed
September 26, 2024).
https://link-gale-com.proxy2.cl.msu.edu/apps/doc/CW0106018129/ECCO?u
=msu_main&sid=bookmark-ECCO&xid=4ff2f7be&pg=5.