A Historical Hemp Timeline:

8000BC
Hemp cultivated and used to make cloth in Asia. 

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2696BC 
Cannabis called a "superior" herb in the world's first medical text, Shen Nung's Pen Ts'ao, in China.

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1500BC
Cannabis-using Scythians sweep through Europe and Asia, settle down everywhere, and invent the scythe.

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500BC
Gautama Buddah survives by eating hempseed.

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450BC
Herodotus records Scythians and Thracians as consuming cannabis and making fine linens of hemp.

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300BC
Carthage and Rome struggle for political and commercial power over hemp and spice trade routes in Mediterranean.

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100BC
Paper made from hemp and mulberry is invented in China.

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100AD
Roman surgeon Dioscorides names the plant cannabis sativa and describes various medicinal uses. Pliny tells of industrial uses and writes a manual on farming hemp.

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500AD
First botanical drawing of hemp in Constantinopolitanus

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600AD
Germans, Franks, Vikings, etc. all use hemp fibre.

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1000AD
The English word 'hempe' first listed in a dictionary.

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1150AD
Muslims use hemp to start Europe's first paper mill. Most paper is made from hemp for the next 700 years.

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1492AD
Hempen sails, caulking and rigging ignite age of discovery and help Columbus and his ships reach America.

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1545
Hemp agriculture crosses the continent overland to Chile.

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1564
King Phillip of Spain orders hemp grown throughout his empire, from modern-day Argentina to Oregon.

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16th-17th Century
Dutch achieve Golden Age through hemp commerce. Explorers find 'wilde hempe' in North America.

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1619
Virginia colony makes hemp cultivation mandatory, followed by most other colonies. Europe pays hemp bounties.

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1700s - Present 1700s
American farmers are required by law to grow hemp in Virginia and other colonies.

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1776
The Declaration of Independence is drafted on hemp paper.

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1797
The U.S.S. Constitution is outfitted with 60 tons of hemp sails and rigging.

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1790s
George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, our founding fathers, grow hemp and extol its benefits.

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1840
Abraham Lincoln uses hemp seed oil to fuel his household lamps.

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1890- 1940s
USDA Chief Botanist, Lyster Dewey, grows five varieties of hemp at Arlington Farms in Virginia, the current site of the Pentagon.

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1916
USDA Bulletin No. 404 shows that hemp produces four times more paper per acre than do trees.

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1938
Popular Mechanics article "New Billion Dollar Crop" explains that new developments in processing technology could use hemp to manufacture over 25,000 different products, "from cellophane to dynamite."

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1942
Henry Ford builds an experimental car body made with hemp fiber, which is ten times stronger than steel.

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1942- 1946
American farmers from Kentucky to Maine to Wisconsin harvest over 150,000 acres of hemp through the USDA's Hemp for  Victory program.

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1957
Hemp is last grown in the U.S. due to government confusion over hemp and drug varieties of the plant, while new government incentives for industry replace natural fibers with plastics, ultimately bankrupting key hemp processors.

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1998
The U.S. begins to import food-grade hemp seed and oil.

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2000- 2010
New processing technologies arise to commercialize "cottonized" hemp, hemp concrete, high-tech hemp composites and other novel hemp applications.

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2004
Ninth Circuit Court decision in Hemp Industries Association vs. DEA permanently protects sales of hemp foods and body care products in the U.S.

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2005
A bill is introduced in the U.S. Congress for the first time to allow states to regulate hemp farming, but to date no committee hearing or floor vote has taken place.

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2007
The first hemp licenses in over 50 years are granted to two North Dakota farmers.

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2010
HIA uncovers diaries and photographs of the USDA's Chief Botantist Lyster Dewey, who grew 5 varieties of hemp on the current site of the Pentagon.

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2010
Rep. Ron Paul makes Congressional statement in support of Hemp History Week.

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2010
1st Annual Hemp History Week produces 200 events in 32 states exposing 100,000 people to hemp and the cause.