Hi everyone!
I wanted to take a moment and introduce myself to the community and offer my services, to budding new companies.
My name is Todd McCormick and I have been actively growing cannabis since 1984, in order to alleviate chronic pain caused by a spinal fusion that I received when I was only 2 years old. As a child, I endured 9 tumors in just eight years between the ages of 2 and 10, and it was during that time that my mother decided to give me medical marihuana. It was 1979, and she was risking quite a bit by doing so but, but she felt like she had the life of her son to lose, so she took the risk and gave me medical cannabis while I was going through both chemotherapy and radiation therapy simultaneously.
Fortunately, I went into spontaneous remission shortly thereafter and did not have another tumor for another 6 years. Since my teens, I have been cancer-free and my life has been focused on bringing the information about cannabis and often the medicine, directly to other patients.
Some of you may have read my name in Jack Herer’s book; The Emperor Wears No Clothes, which I have been an editor of since 1994. After Jack passed away in 2010, I edited and we released the 12th edition of his book, complete with memorials to Jack.
Some of you may have seen me in a couple of the documentaries that I have both appeared in and helped produce: The Union: The Business Behind Getting High, and more recently; The Culture High. I wrote my first book about cannabis cultivation in 1997 simply titled, How To Grow Medical Marijuana, while I was fighting the federal government over being one of the very first people the federal government arrested after the passage of proposition 215. At the time, I had 4,116 plants growing in my Bel Air mansion, and was working on identifying and authenticating as many distinctly different varieties of cannabis I could acquire.
Unfortunately for me, I became one of the very first medical cannabis cases that the federal government denied a medical necessity defense to. I adamantly opposed their position and refused to cooperate in any way and ended up serving five years in federal prison. Upon release, I went right back to my activism, producing documentaries, co-producing fundraisers at the Playboy Mansion for marijuana policy reform, and in 2009, I even rented the Los Angeles Convention Center and hosted the very first THC Expo to an audience of between 40,000 and 50,000 people.
These days I am still cultivating cannabis and collecting cultivars. Currently I have over 100 distinctly different varieties of living plants in my collection, I also have heirloom varieties such as Afghan directly from Mel Frank, as well as Original Haze and Skunk #1, and many many more. If you pick up the latest edition of Grow magazine at any Barnes & Noble, you can read my latest article titled Classic Cultivars, where I talk about creating a type of “Cannabis Preservation Society”, which will seek to preserve unique genetics for future generations.
I am available for consulting on a variety of projects related to the Cannabis industry. I’m also very interested in talking to nurseries and producers who are interested in working with me to disseminate some of the genetics that I’ve been collecting for decades. My overall goal is to get the different varieties of cannabis that people need, into the hands of the people who need them.
I maintain my own website: www.TalkingCANNABIS.live
I sometimes do a YouTube show with other rather experienced growers from the industry
(We are on hiatus right now, but we may be picking it back up soon.): Talking Cannabis - YouTube
And you can check out my cultivation & photography at: www.instagram.com/growmedicine
I hope everyone is having a very high and happy day!
Todd McCormick
https://twitter.com/toddpmccormick
todd@growmedicine.org
310-913-4407 office
Skype: toddmccormick
