JF Ptak Science Books Overall Post 5139
Elmer James Rollings' The Silent Horror (1939) is a two-fisted introduction and appraisal of narcotics published in Wichita, Kansas by the Defender Press, 1939. (It also seems that this pamphlet is pretty rare--there are no copies of the work found in WorldCat.)
Rollings contributed at least four other narcotics-related works (“Your Girl or My Boy May be Next”, “Marijuana—the Weed of Woe”, “Junk, Junk Peddler and Junkers”, “Perils of the Poppy” and “I Saw Him Die”.) There were a few other short works non-drug-related, including something on cowboy songs and also a book on bible prophesy.
The major chapters of The Silent Horror deal with the shades of narcotics: 'Opium, the King of Dope'; 'Crown Prince, Morphine'; 'Cocaine, the Princess of Perdition'; 'Marijuana, the Dutchess of Despair'; 'the Dope Peddlers'; and 'Addicts'.
Here's an excerpt:
"An eighteen-year-old boy in a Midwestern city smoked two "reefers" and an hour later choked his sweetheart to death because she refused his shocking, lustful advances, born in a marijuana-crazed brain... A sixteen-year-old boy shot his mother and father to death with his father's shotgun after smoking several "Mary Anns" given to him by a new friend whose acquaintance he made by chance. He could neither explain nor remember the killing when the effects of the drug had worn off and sobbed himself into hysterical grief when told of his crime. And so, on and on, runs the record of thievery, forgery, banditry, kidnapping, brutal murder, degeneracy, and rape, all chargeable to this paralyzer of conscience and inflamer of depravity --- Marijuana! "
Here's a detail of one of the photos--this one has a caption stating that 60 addicts were picked up in 60 minutes, though Mr. Rollings declined to say where this all took place:
Comments