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Museum Comment
The article 'From Opium to Hash Eesh' reflects the burgeoning trend towards prohibition that was occuring at this period of the twentieth century. Dr. Carleton Simon's description of the lurid vice and 'narcotic evil' he encountered through his routine practice as Special Deputy Police Commissioner in Charge of the New York City Police Narcotic Division takes on the narrative style of a fictional crime writer. The mystique and kudos associated with drug enforcement in the films and fiction of recent times was not missed by the Police Commissioner back in 1921, in his attempts to recount his brushes with the criminal underbelly. Once again, we see substance use inextricably linked with issues of race. Drugs are brought into America by outsiders, foreign nationals, who must be stopped at all costs through a 'war waged night and day'. This war is marked by the self-sacrifice of the Commissioner's task force 'who work fifteen to twenty hours per day', a division motivated by a common fever, boardering on religious zeal, in their efforts to stamp out drug supply and use.
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