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KENTUCKY - THE HEMP CAPITAL OF THE WORLD
1800
Graves family is farming in Kentucky. Hemp is part of the rotation.
1910
Jacob Hughes Graves II is farming hemp in Kentucky, known as “the best in the world”.
1925
Jacob H. Graves II and Philip Glass gather hemp seed from all over central Kentucky.
PROHIBITION
1937
Hemp is included in the Marijuana Tax Act and is illegal to grow.
1940
Rise of tobacco as a cash crop.
1942
Graves’ seed confiscated by Federal Marshals.
1944
Graves family is required to grow hemp for the war effort. One of their farms is appropriated for military use. Their seed was never returned. The Federal government’s Marijuana Tax Act and it strenuous regulations discouraged further commercial growing of hemp.
1957
Last commercial hemp crop grown in Wisconsin.
1971
Controlled Substance Act labeled industrial hemp as a controlled drug.
1990
Tobacco is on the way out. Ag scientists consider hemp as an alternative, but the crop is still illegal.
ADVOCACY
1993
Joe Hickey and Dan Wotten form the 4-F’s Club (“Future, Fuel and Fiber Farmers of America) and begin meeting with legislators about hemp.
1993
Joe Hickey met Prof James Hopkins who wrote History of Hemp in Kentucky, who said Woodford Spears & Sons in Paris, Kentucky still had hemp processing equipment and historic records.
1994
Joe and Sue Hickey convince Kentucky Governor Brereton Jones to form a commission to study hemp in Kentucky.
1994
The Kentucky Hemp Growers Cooperative is reorganized with Jake Graves as Chairman of the Board, Andy Graves as President, David Spalding as Secretary, and Joe Hickey Sr. as Executive Director. Board Members were Jim Baron and Tom Greathouse.
1994
Kentucky Governor, Brereton Jones, announces a Hemp Task Force.
1994
Andy Graves, Dave Spalding, Joe Hickey collect feral hemp seeds from Central Kentucky farms.
1994
Jake Graves III, Joe Hickey, David Spalding and Andy Graves build relationships with the first hemp growers in Ontario to study their approach to hemp.
1995
Jean Lapris, Woody Harrelson, Anita Roddick and Joe Hickey are founding partners in Kenex — Canada’s first fiber & seed processing facility.
1995
Woody funds the University of Kentucky Research Survey Center’s state poll that showed 78% of Kentuckians favored hemp production.
1996
Woody Harrelson brought international experts to visit Donna Cockrell’s grade school class to talk about industrial hemp.
1996
Kentucky Hemp Museum and Library’s mobile exhibit were created and Craig Lee attended fairs and public events across Kentucky and America.
1996
Kentucky’s Internationsa Hemp Conference was organized by Joe Hickey, Executive Director of Kentucky Hemp Growers Cooperative Association. Woody Harrelson moderated the event with participants from England, Canada, Ukraine, Hungary and The Netherlands.
TESTING THE LAW
1996
In collaboration with Joe Hickey, Andy Graves and Dave Spalding, Actor Woody Harrelson challenge the Kentucky law by planting seeds in Lee County to provoke his arrest. Former Kentucky governor Louie Nunn served on his defense team. Harrelson was later acquitted of growing marijuana.
1996
Andy Graves speaks at the American Farm Bureau Federation’s annual meeting in Reno and wins their support, passing a resolution supporting industrial hemp farming across the United States.
1996
Joe Hickey arranges the breeding feral Kentucky hemp cultivars at Kenex’s seed laboratory in Ontario and developed a hemp seed variety called “Deni.”
1998
Harrelson funds the University of Kentucky’s Economic Impact of Industrial Hemp in Kentucky study.
1998
Graves, Hickey, and Spalding organize the Louisville Forum debate between DEA and Woody Harrelson.
1998
University of Louisville’s Professor, John I. Gilderbloom, Ph.D., weighed the eveidence on the economics and ecology of industrial hemp in his paper titled “Hemp: Rhetoric & Reality”
1998
UK Press reissuance of “A History of the Hemp Industry in Kentucky”
1998
Graves, Hickey, and Spalding were founding members of the North American Industrial Hemp Council and authored the Council’s name, mission and vision statements.
1998
Kentucky Hemp Grower’s Coop filed a federal lawsuit to allow farmers to cultivate industrial hemp.
1998
Ketchum Ad agency’s campaign defames “Kentucky Hemp Beer” with “fun ads” at behest of Budweiser, forcing the closing of Lexington’s first succesful micro-brewer.
1999
DEA siezes Kenex U.S. hemp shipments in an effort to destroy the company.
1999
Hemp Museum opens doors into Kentucky history in Versailles, Kentucky.
1998
Graves, Spalding and Hickey spearhead efforts to write Kentucky’s Hemp Bill with Representative Joe Barrows.
2000
Graves, Spalding and Hickey work with former governor, Louie B. Nunn, to pass the Hemp Bill.
2000
Governor Nunn delivers hemp bales to members of Pine RIdge Oglala Sioux Tribe in the shadow of Mount Rushmore to replace their hemp crop destroyed by the DEA.
2000
Jury acquits Woody Harrelson for planting industrial hemp seeds.
2000
Graves, Spalding and Hickey work with former governor, Louie B. Nunn, to write and pass Kentucky House Bill 855.
2000
Senator David Williams holds the Hemp Bill vote until he is visited by former Governor Nunn who instructs him to put House Bill 855 up for a Senate vote.
2002
DEA attempts to ban hemp foods in the United States.
2003
Graves, Spalding and Hickey continue to develop Kentucky Hemp cultivars in Canada.
2005
Graves, Hickey and Spalding continue lobbying for Kentucky and federal Hemp legislation.
2013
Kentucky Hemp Bill passes.
2013
Graves, Spalding and Hickey formalize international partnerships to provide seed and markets for their growers.
NEW AGE OF INNOVATION
2014
Federal Farm Bill of 2013 signed into law enabling cultivation and commercialization of industrial hemp when states have enabled legislation.
2014
Atalo Holdings, Inc. is organized along with Hemp Oil Kentucky, Kenex Kentucky, and Kentucky Hemp Seed R& D, in a effort to provide leadership in research, development and commercialization of industrial Hemp.
2014
Seeds are imported into US for planting. DEA attempts to hold up seed.
2014
Jake Graves III plants industrial hemp on the family farm for the first time since 1944.
2014
First harvest since 1944. Atalo has five farmers under contract in 2014.
2014
Atalo begins negotiations for 127-acre Hemp Research Campus.
2014
Atalo files first grower applications.
2015
Atalo files 35 grower applications fro 500+ acres.
VICTORY FOR HEMP
2018
Hemp Farming Act of 2018 is signed into law with the 2018 Farm Bill, legalizing hemp as a commodity.
2019
Atalo is permitted 10,000 acres, one of the largest permitted growers in the US.
2019
True to our mission of research and development, Atalo and Anavii Market partner with Space Tango to study the hemp cultivar in the microgravity environment of space aboard the International Space Station. Kentucky seed was launched to the Station by Space X17 on May 6, 2019.