"In a universe where everything is holy nothing is sacred."
San Francisco: Chthon Press, 1969. Saddle-stapled cardstock wraps printed in blue, yellow, and green, 11.25 x 8.5 in. 20pp. Contents printed variously in brown, pink, purple, and green. Scattered soiling to covers, the interiors of which show minor dampstaining. Oxidation to staples. A touch of crimping to bottom corner of leaves. Else a sharp copy, very good or better.
The first and, as far as we can determine, only issue of this "factual satirical centenial [sic] periodical," which more to the point might have billed itself with epithets like blasphemous, salacious, and scurrilous. Contents feature provocative and humorous takes on everything from the assassination of John F. Kennedy, to the Vietnam War, to national and ethnic stereotypes (in rather poor taste). With a more straight-faced piece on the classical erotic art of Japan (with a graphic center spread in pink) and a section of pot-related queries answered by "Mary Jane Superweed," author of The Marijuana Consumer's and Dealer's Guide (1968).
We suspect that editor and main contributor John Mann may be the same who in 1971 founded The Church of the Tree of Life, which was apparently little more than a front for a mail-order business supplying non-scheduled psychoactive substances (per MAPS, Volume XII, Number 1, 2002). If true, that would also make him editor of the scarce 1972 drug pamphlet, The First Book of Sacraments of the Church of The Tree of Life, as well as author, under the name John A. Mann, of the 1980 book, Secrets of Life Extension.
A scarce publication, both in the trade and institutionally, with OCLC reporting a scant four holdings.
