FEATS
TEXT NELL SALZMAN
[MAGIC MUSHROOMS] an introduction to mycology
I come from a long line of mushroom hunters. My grandparents founded the Telluride Mushroom Festival, a four-day mycology conference in the Rocky Mountains. Guests attend lectures, forage, participate in culinary competitions, and trip.
my older cousin babysitting my brother and me in Telluride while tripping on mushrooms. We were eating pizza and swimming around in the pool at our hotel when she told me she was on them. I asked her if it was making her sad. “No Nell, it’s magical,” she said, laughing. My grandpa’s interest in psychedelics was scientific, not spiritual. In 1981, he founded the festival with the help of my dad, my grandma Joanne Salzman, Gary Lincoff (a self-taught mycologist and author based out of New York), and Andrew Weil (a doctor known for pioneering integrative and natural medicinal techniques). The festival began in 1977 as a conference in Aspen, primarily for doctors who wanted to learn more about mushroom poisoning. As this group of credentialed physicians—my grandpa included—delved into mycology, some became interested in psychedelic mushrooms. But about half of the organizers rejected any inquiry into the topic. So the group split after the 1979 conference, and the psychedelic side set up their tents elsewhere, eventually landing in Telluride, then a low-key, hippyish town, in 1981. In Telluride, the festival became a yearly event where a big group of people could gather to talk openly about psychedelics. Those who were interested in magic mushrooms could come talk to scientists who were promoting their medicinal effects, advocates who favored legalization, artists who wanted to interpret mushrooms, chefs who wanted to enjoy them for dinner, and others who wanted to be mush
VOLUME 44 ISSUE 09
ILLUSTRATION CLAIRE CHASSE
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The Telluride Mushroom Festival was, for me, a formative and surreal part of my childhood. The multi-day affair always culminated in a parade, in which everyone would dress up like mushrooms and march down the streets of the sleepy mountain town, chanting and banging on drums. We wore papier-mâché hats painted with dots and tie dye shirts, watching as people around us twirled and shouted, in various states of lucidity. My grandparents especially loved the festival and the parade. They would tape white puffballs to their denim hats and carry signs that advocated for the legalization of psychedelics. A large mushroom float pulled by a red pickup truck, painted like a shroom with white patches, trailed behind the procession, honking. It felt like a fairytale. After hunting mushrooms all day, we ate our harvested crop with fresh peach pie. Our cohort was an eclectic group of mycologists—Paul Stamets, Art Goodtimes, Linnea Gillman, the Adams family, John Sir Jesse, and others—who were open and accepting. We reflected on our favorite works of art, music, and poetry from the day, and discussed the spots where we’d found the most mushrooms. We flung Latin names around. Sometimes, we even tried new species that had never before been eaten. As a young girl at the parade, I wasn’t aware of how many people were tripping. I thought Telluride was one of the most beautiful places in the world, and that it just made everyone really happy. One of my earliest memories is of
DESIGN BRIAANNA CHIU
My grandpa always said that he wanted to eat psychedelics on his deathbed. I grew up hunting mushrooms with him in Colorado forests, watching him bend down to flip them over, inspect the undersides, dust them off. He showed me how to identify them, to intuit where they were most likely to grow. He taught me to look for them at the edges of meadows, amidst rocky craters interspersed with strawberry plants. We were always looking for Boletus edulis—a choice edible. Early spring rain promised a good bolete year. But it had to rain later in the summer too, so basically you were hoping for rain all summer. We would drive to the mountains in search of auburn caps with glossy stems and delicate pores. If we were lucky and other foragers hadn’t gotten there first, we returned home with our baskets full. We would fry them in olive oil and shower generous amounts of them on our pizza or pasta. My grandpa compared mushroom hunting to not just learning a new language, but to a new awareness of life.
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