Albert Hofmann, Father of LSD, Dead

Posted by Ina Woolcott

Dr. Albert Hofmann, the father of LSD, and the man who launched a thousand trips died age102 on the 29th April 2008. I wish we would have gone to Basel this year now - ironically we did say that we should go this year as it nay be the last time we see Albert Hoffman, who first synthesized the drug in 1938 and then learned of its hallucinatory effects 5 years later, after accidentally ingesting it.

Dr. Hofmann called LSD ‘Medicine for the Soul, and although he took LSD hundreds of times, he saw it as a powerful and potentially dangerous psychotropic drug that demanded respect. The pleasures of the psychedelic experience were unimportant to him, rather it was the drug's value as a revelatory aid for contemplating and understanding what he saw as humanity's oneness with nature. That perception of union, which came to Dr. Hofmann as an almost religious epiphany while still a child, directed much of his personal and professional life. His love for life can be seen clearly in his face no matter what age. You can clearly see his loving soul shine through.

According to Rick Doblin, president of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies, Dr Hofmann died of a heart attack at his home in Basel, in a statement posted on the association’s website.