Pebbles Trippet’s Achievement is Legal Marijuana in California

By Fred Gardner

On New Year’s Eve, NBC San Francisco will air a documentary that gives activist Pebbles Trippet proper credit for advancing the movement to legalize marijuana. Peter Coyote narrates the 45-minute video, which uses the Ken Burns template of integrated interviews, still photos, and spoken commentary.

This is must-see TV.

Coyote: “Pebbles Trippet grew up in Oklahoma when the world was at war. [This is inaccurate. She grew up during the Cold War.] She has never shied away from a fight. As a teenager in the ’50s, she became involved in the Civil Rights movement and helped integrate lunch counters in Tulsa. In the ’60s, she fought to end the Vietnam War. In 1970, she came to California and found a new cause.”

Trippet (now in her mid-70s): “We did end the war.” She hears the overstatement and immediately corrects herself, “We ended the draft. And part of that was the marijuana movement. It was in the background, at least for me.”

The connection between pro-marijuana and pro-peace sentiment among Americans in the Vietnam War-era is rarely mentioned or analyzed. Knowing the government was lying about marijuana made millions…