The High Times Papers: Inside the Corporate Takeover That Killed the Buzz

By Steven Hager

n 1988, Steven Hager became editor of High Times, a magazine on the brink of collapse. Over the next fifteen years he helped turn it into the voice of a global movement. He created the Cannabis Cup in Amsterdam, turned an obscure Marin County ritual called 420 into a worldwide ceremony, sent the High Times Freedom Fighters marching with Jack Herer to launch the hemp movement, and brought the magazine's spirit to the Rainbow Gatherings and the WHEE festivals.

Then the money arrived, and with it the lawyers, the board fights and a quiet corporate takeover. The High Times Papers is Hager's account of how the counterculture's most famous magazine lost its soul.

Every chapter opens with one of the company's annual reports, which Hager wrote as editor from 1988 into the 2000s, paraphrased in his own words. The reports track circulation, advertising, spin-offs and the balance sheet year by year. Around them, Hager tells what was really happening behind the numbers:

Discovering the seed breeders and the first Cannabis CupHow 420 went from a high-school code to a global holidayThe Freedom Fighters and the birth of the hemp movementSummers at the Rainbow Gathering with Jack HererBuilding the WHEE festivals in OregonThe tragedy of Rainbow FarmThe Bubblehash War and the Peace CupStaff feuds, film and TV projects that died at the last minute, and the takeover that pushed him out

Funny, angry and deeply personal, the book is a firsthand record of the years when cannabis culture came out of the shadows, and of what happened when the business side decided the buzz was worth more than the mission.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: B0HMTRTYHW
• ISBN13: 9798182827065
• Release Date: October 2026
• Publisher: Steven Hager
• Length: 588 Pages
• Weight: 2.06 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.3" x 6.0" x 9.0"