Sure the 1960s were a crazy time. The era has become synonymous with drug use and many songs from that era have been tainted with the suggestion that they are about drugs. Was Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds really a code for LSD? (John Lennon always denied this accusation saying that the title was inspired by an image that his son had drawn and named). Was the Byrds Eight Miles High referring to a plane ride or another type of flight? The biggest shock of all was realizing that Puff the Magic Dragon was actually a song about smoking marijuana.
When you look at the lyrics, it’s easy to see how this story spread. The name of the song was quite cheeky. Puff was another word for smoking and dragon could be split into two words for the term drag. He took a drag on the tube and took a drag on the joint. Also, what did people who smoked marijuana use to make their joints? Documents And what was the child’s name is the song? It was Little Jackie Paper. Some have even suggested that the magical land of Hanah Lee was really Hanalei; a Hawaiian town known for its potent brand of herb.
However, the song’s writers claim that Puff The Magic Dragon was a song about the loss of innocence and a boy who overcame his childhood customs. The song began life as a poem written by 19-year-old Cornell University student Leonard Lipton. He showed the poem to his friend Peter Yarrow, who put a melody to the poem and added more lyrics. Yarrow went on to form the band Peter, Paul and Mary and his portrayal of Puff reached number two on the charts.
It wasn’t until the song hit the charts that the theory that it was a drug song came to light. It is a theory that still exists today despite numerous public statements by the authors to the contrary. Lipton claimed that his poem was based on the Ogden Nash poem “Really-O, Truly-O Dragon.” He wrote that “[It is about] the loss of innocence and having to face the adult world. It’s probably not about drugs. I can tell you that at Cornell in 1959 no one smoked weed … It would be insidious to propagandize the tough in a song for young children. “
Peter Yarrow would later add the following comment: “When they wrote Puff, I was too innocent to know about drugs. What kind of petty son of a bitch would write a children’s song with a covert message about drugs?”
