Hemp Products
- Hemp cultivation for the production of fabric, rope, and paper is an ancient worldly tradition dating back to the beginning of Chinese civilization in 4000 BC. The Hemp plant produces the strongest natural fiber on the planet, for this reason it has been used by civilizations around the world throughout time. This includes America as well, as it was a major cash crop until it?s prohibition in the 1930?s.
- Hemp is a sustainable crop for a variety of climates because of the fact that it is essentially a weed that is extremely drought tolerant. A weed that will grow in virtually any soil without the use of chemical pesticides or toxic fertilizers. It is among the earth's primary renewable resources: Trees cut down to make paper can take fifty years to grow back while hemp can be cultivated in as little as one hundred days, and (according to the USDA. can yield four times more paper over a twenty year period. Hemp also produces three times as much fiber per acre as cotton. These facts make Hemp an excellent fallow crop for land that has previously suffered from overuse. The long fibers of the Hemp plant make for an excellent quality cloth with remarkable strength and durability that is also mildew, soil, and shrinkage resistant.
- The collections on this site contain hemp fabrics that have been produced in several different countries. From the far Northwest regions of Nepal, into the villages of the higher elevations of the Himalayas, come handspun, hand-woven Hemp fabrics that have been woven with the same traditional back strap loom for over a millennium. Some of these products also use high quality machine woven hemp fabrics that have come from Central Asia and Eastern Europe. These fabrics have been washed and softened, producing some of the finest hemp fabrics to date.
| Hemp History | |
| 10,000 B.C. - Cultivation of hemp for textiles and paper in Asia. | |
| 5th century B.C. - mid. 19th century - Most of all ships sails were made from hemp. | |
| AD200 - Cultivation techniques arrive in Europe. | |
| 1600's - Mandatory hemp cultivation in colonial America due to crop shortages. Farmers were fined or thrown in jail for not complying. | |
| 1700's - The first flag is sewn from hemp canvas. | |
| Ben Franklin starts the first continental paper mill using hemp fabric scraps for pulp. | |
| Daughters of the American Revolution make soldiers uniforms with thread spun from hemp fibers. | |
| Hemp paper is used for the first two drafts of the Declaration of Independence. | |
| Until 1800, hempseed oil was the most commonly used lighting oil in America and the world. | |
| 1800's - Hemp goes west. It covers the Conestoga wagons. | |
| Until the mid 1800's, 80% of all textiles for clothes, linens, rugs, drapes, quilts, sheet and towels were made from cannabis hemp. | |
| Until 1883, most of all paper in the world was made with hemp fiber, including books, maps, bibles, paper money, etc. | |
| Painters such as Van Gogh, and Rembrandt primarily painted on hemp canvas. | |
| 1916 - USDA bulletin #404 urges production of hemp paper. | |
| 1937 - Several US industrial interests lobby Congress, linking industrial grade hemp to the drug, marijuana. | |
| The 1937 Marijuana Tax Act passes into law, eventually leading to the industry's collapse. | |
| 1941 - Supplies of Philippine manila are cut off during WWII. In response, the US Department of Defense lifts the hemp ban and production soars. | |
| 1942 - Hemp is used during WWII for parachute webbing, rigging, ropes and fire hoses on the ships, military shoes are stitched with hemp, and hempseed oil is used as aircraft engine lubricant. | |
| 1955 - Ban on hemp farming is re-instated. | |
| 1993 - The present day hemp industry makes its first sale. | |
- Although the growing of Hemp as an agricultural crop remains banned in the United States (currently all hemp seed and fiber is imported), the Hemp industry has been growing at a steady rate since the ban for importing fabrics was lifted in 1993. This growth is a result of the recognition that Hemp is a sustainable crop that could in fact have remarkable effects concerning our overused farmlands, therefore proving to be a great benefit to the environment. Eventually hemp cultivation in America will benefit the local job and tax base. The domestic industries that would be boosted include agriculture, construction, cosmetics, food, furniture, paper, plastics, recycling, retailing, and textiles.
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9-9-04 I was so excited when I started reading all this history -- because I love to learn new things. Up until the point you mentioned Betsy Ross. Betsy Ross was a member of the Ross family in a small town in New England. That family -- made up the story of her sewing the first flag to attract tourism to the town. The fact is, no one knows who wove the first flag and the government thought that it was such a nice little story, they didn't do anything about it.
A correction has been made to the timeline above.
4-23-03 It was around 2000, that I started liking Hemp. I bought some hemp thread and made a hat out of it. I wish I could "Grow It" but I'd get locked up for "Growing a Plant"! I quote Johnny Dep's character in the movie BLOW "I walked across an imaginary line with a bunch of plants!" That's my charge?