Hemp, you might say, built America. A quick-growing, regenerative source of food and extraordinarily durable fiber, hemp arrived in North America with the Puritans around 1545. Early colonists used it for building materials, clothing, ship sails, cordage, and so many other essentials that, by the mid-1600s, several colonies mandated its planters grow the stuff. It was one of the nation’s primary crops through the 1700s and 1800s.

In 1937, however, for myriad reasons which largely centered on the fact that hemp and marijuana are actually strains of the same plant — cannabis — President Franklin Roosevelt signed a bill that ultimately banned hemp production in America. Hemp remained planta non grata for the next eight decades, until the Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018 legalized hemp production at the federal level. Four years ago this spring, hundreds of first-time hemp farmers planted Michigan's first legal hemp crops since 1937.

What was predicted to be a mega-cash crop for Michigan farmers boomed and busted in short order, save for a few scrappy and savvy entrepreneurial farmers who are finding ways to keep their hemp farms profitable while they wait for government and other industries to catch up. Read about the challenges facing hemp farmers across Michigan — and the innovative ways they're trying to process and get their crops to market — in this week's Northern Express, sister publication of The Ticker. Check out the Northern Express online, or pick up a free copy on newsstands at nearly 700 spots in 14 counties across northern Michigan.