Meet Mary Jane Rathbun, The Medical Marijuana Activist Who Baked Hundreds Of Pot Brownies For AIDS Patients
At first glance, few would guess that Mary Jane Rathbun, an elderly woman with thick glasses, was one of the most well-known marijuana activists in American history. But Rathbun was famous for her “magical” marijuana brownies — and her fervent belief in the medical benefits of cannabis.
While living in San Francisco in the 1980s, Rathburn found herself in the epicenter of the AIDS epidemic. Already known for baking marijuana-infused brownies in her kitchen, Rathburn soon began distributing her baked goods to patients at San Francisco General Hospital, dubbing the AIDS patients she met as her “kids.”
Despite multiple arrests, Mary Jane Rathbun — known as “Brownie Mary” — would become one of the main driving forces behind the legalization of medical marijuana in California.
Mary Jane Rathbun was born on December 22, 1922, in Chicago, Illinois, and grew up in a strict Irish Catholic household in Minneapolis, Minnesota. According to a 1996 New York Times article, she demonstrated her ability to resist authority at a young age by fighting back against a nun who was trying to cane her. Shortly thereafter, Rathbun moved out of her family home.
As a teenager, Rathbun began working as a full-time waitress, a job she would work for most of her life. Alongside working, she also became involved in social activism, supporting causes like unions and abortion.
Then, during World War II, Rathbun moved to San Francisco and briefly married a man there. The couple would go on to have a daughter together, Peggy, who tragically died in a car accident in the 1970s.
Around the same time, Mary Jane Rathbun fatefully crossed paths with Dennis Peron, a San Francisco cannabis activist. After this meeting, Rathbun dove headfirst into the world of marijuana.
While working at the International House of Pancakes (IHOP), Rathbun began a secondary gig: selling marijuana brownies. By the 1980s, Rathbun was baking hundreds of cannabis-infused brownies a day. She advertised them on bulletin boards as “magically delicious” brownies.
Her (far-from-subtle) advertisement eventually caught the eye of authorities. On January 17, 1981, police came to her home, found more than 600 of her “magic” brownies, and arrested the 57-year-old. (Rathbun’s response to her arrest was a succinct: “Oh, shit.”).
The notoriety from Rathbun’s arrest grew her business, and earned her the nickname “Brownie Mary.” But it also did more than that.
Following her arrest and conviction, Rathbun was sentenced to 500 hours of community service — a sentence that Rathbun would complete in just 60 days. While volunteering for the Shanti Project, an organization dedicated to helping HIV/AIDS patients, Rathbun witnessed first-hand the horrific impact of the growing AIDS epidemic.
Suddenly, Brownie Mary’s business took on a new purpose.
Mary Jane Rathbun soon became a volunteer at San Francisco General Hospital — in 1982, she was arrested for the second time while carrying marijuana brownies for a friend with cancer there — and was thus on the front line of the AIDS epidemic as it ravaged San Francisco.
At the hospital, Rathbun passed out her brownies to patients struggling with the disease. Rathbun had noticed that the marijuana helped AIDS patients and cancer patients with side effects like pain and nausea, and she set out to bake a truly impressive amount of brownies each month. While most of her baking supplies were financed by her $650 social security check, people across the city also donated their cannabis.
Her impact was recognized and celebrated city-wide. In 1986, San Francisco General Hospital awarded her “Volunteer of the Year.” A decade later, Brownie Mary and Dennis Peron were both invited to be the Grand Marshals of the San Francisco Gay Pride Parade.
“Brownie Mary was providing marijuana brownies to terminally ill AIDS patients in San Francisco General Hospital, so it was an act of mercy,” Rathbun’s attorney J. Tony Serra, recalled. “Only her humanitarian conscience guided her. She never made a penny on it and she exposed herself to the full fury of the law. She couldn’t have lasted long in the state penitentiary. So she was very brave.”
Indeed, even if the city’s officials wanted to stop Rathbun, Brownie Mary was ready to be arrested as many times as necessary.
“If the narcs think I’m gonna stop baking brownies for my kids with AIDS, they can go f–k themselves in Macy’s window,” Rathbun announced in front of San Francisco City Hall during a rally in 1992.
Alongside baking her brownies, Brownie Mary continued volunteering at organizations across the city and even helped Peron open the San Francisco Cannabis Buyers Club, the first public cannabis dispensary in the United States. She and Peron also published their own cookbook, though Rathbun kept her brownie recipe a secret.
“When and if they legalize it, I’ll sell my brownie recipe to Betty Crocker or Duncan Hines,” she remarked, “and take the profits and buy an old Victorian for my kids with AIDS.”
In 1992, Brownie Mary additionally testified about the positive impacts of marijuana for medical purposes and secured the San Francisco Board of Supervisors’ resolution to make cannabis possession a lowest priority offense. In 1996, she and Peron also successfully advocated for Proposition 215, a California law that permitted the use of medical marijuana.
For her work, the board declared August 25th “Brownie Mary Day,” which is still observed to this day.
While Mary Jane Rathbun worked tirelessly to take care of the sick in San Francisco, she often neglected her own serious health issues.
In her older age, Rathbun struggled with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and osteoarthritis. She had been diagnosed with colon cancer (and beat it). She often experienced physical pain in her knees, which had both been replaced.
Like many of her patients, Rathbun self-medicated with her cannabis brownies. She consumed half of one in the morning, and half in the afternoon, and claimed it helped her manage her physical pain.
However, by 1996, Rathbun’s condition deteriorated to the point where she could no longer walk, and consequently, no longer bake. In 1998, she moved into the Laguna Honda Hospital nursing home.
There, she passed away from a heart attack on April 10, 1999, at 76 years old. Seven days later, a crowd of over 300 people held a candlelight vigil in her honor in the Castro neighborhood where her legacy began.
Following Mary Jane Rathbun’s death, her friends, loved ones, and patients called her “Florence Nightingale of the medical marijuana movement,” in honor of her contributions to the city of San Francisco and impact on the medical marijuana movement in the United States.
Her brownie recipe, however, remains a secret to this day.
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