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Abstract
Functioning at the epicenter of social and drug experimentation, the Haight Ashbury Free Medical Clinic and its larger entity, the Haight Ashbury Free Clinics (HAFC), founded by David E. Smith, M.D., in June 1967, exerted from its beginnings a national influence far beyond its size and scope. Not only did HAFC serve as the prototype for a national and international free and community clinic movement, its practitioners' understanding and treatment innovations for substance abuse provided decades of new approaches for coming to grips with the rapidly evolving national and international drug scene. HAFC's pioneering impact on community drug abuse treatment was amplified by the dissemination of seminal articles in the Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, also founded by Dr. Smith in 1967, and by a comprehensive series of medical training conferences sponsored over the years by Dr. Smith and the Clinics. As the Clinics' CEO and subsequently as Director of Training and Education and finally as Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, it was my honor and privilege to play a role in the Clinics' phenomenal rise and sustained influence on this nation's drug abuse treatment policies and treatment approaches. The following is a brief review of that role and the circumstances surrounding it.