LSD, the CIA & the History of Psychedelic Science

In 1938, Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann accidentally developed the potent psychedelic LSD, although it would be several years before Hofmann realized what he’d created. During the Cold War, the CIA launched a top-secret mind control project, code-named MKUltra, experimenting with LSD and other psychedelic substances, drugging military personnel, CIA employees, and civilians, often without their consent or even their knowledge. At the same time, the CIA was funding university research on psychedelics, involving scientists like Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson and counterculture luminaries like Ken Kesey and Allen Ginsberg. Although mid-20th Century scientists had seen therapeutic promise in psychedelics, Congress passed the Controlled Substances Act in 1970, which classified LSD, along with psilocybin, MDMA, and peyote, as Schedule I drugs, defined by the DEA as having “no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse.”

Joining me in this episode is Dr. Benjamin Breen, Associate Professor of History at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and author of Tripping on Utopia: Margaret Mead, the Cold War, and the Troubled Birth of Psychedelic Science.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. The mid-episode music is Psychedelic Atmospheric Dream Guitar, by Sonican, available for use via the Pixabay Content License. The episode image is a photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash; free to use under the Unsplash License.

Additional Sources:

• “Your employer may be adding another health benefit to its roster: psychedelic drugs,” by Sonya Collins, Fortune, January 19, 2024.
• “Psychedelics gave terminal patients relief from their intense anxiety,” by By Meryl Davids Landau, The Washington Post, January 13, 2024.
• “People were using psychedelic drugs in Bronze Age Europe, study finds,” by Sheena Goodyear, CBC Radio, April 12, 2023.
• “Prehistoric peyote use: alkaloid analysis and radiocarbon dating of archaeological specimens of Lophophora from Texas,” by Hesham R El-Seedi, et al, Journal of ethnopharmacology, 2005, vol. 101,1-3: 238-42.
• “'Apparently Useless': The Accidental Discovery of LSD,” by Tom Shroder, The Atlantic, September 9, 2014.
• “The Evolutionary Origins of Psychedelics,” by Noah Whiteman, Time Magazine, November 29, 2023.
• “A brief history of psychedelic psychiatry,” by Mo Costandi, The Guardian, September 2, 2014.
• “Margaret Mead: Human Nature and the Power of Culture,” Library of Congress.
• “History of CIA,” Central Intelligence Agency.
• “What We Know About the CIA’s Midcentury Mind-Control Project,” by Kat Eschner, Smithsonian Magazine, April 13, 2017.
• “The CIA’s Appalling Human Experiments with Mind Control,” by Brianna Nofil, History.com.
• American Trip: Set, Setting, and the Psychedelic Experience in the Twentieth Century, by Ido Hartogsohn, 2020.
• “What to know about Colorado’s psychedelic law,” by Andrew Kenney, Colorado Public Radio News, June 21, 2023.

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