Man accidentally took the first acid trip in history. Then made a risky decision and found his ‘problem child’

An ordinary day in his life, one honest mistake, and it led to the discovery of LSD. Albert Hofmann never thought he’d be going down a trippy road when he first touched LSD. But that wasn’t the last time he touched the drug either.

In 1938, a 32-year-old Swiss chemist named Albert Hofmann was working at Sandoz Laboratories in Basel, trying to synthesize new stimulants from ergot fungus. It was a toxic grain mold that had haunted humanity for centuries. His goal was to find a circulatory and respiratory stimulant by synthesizing the active compounds in ergot.

One of those experiments produced a compound called lysergic acid diethylamide-25, or LSD-25. But it showed no useful medical properties, so Hofmann stored it away and moved on. Five years later, on April 16, 1943, curiosity got the better of him. While resynthesizing LSD-25, he accidentally absorbed a small amount through his fingertips.

Humanity’s first trip on LSD

Moments later, he felt strange, light-headed, anxious, and overwhelmed. He described seeing an “uninterrupted stream of fantastic images,” while being in an “extremely stimulated imagination” and “a dreamlike state.” He had no idea he’d just experienced the world’s first acid trip. Thankfully, for him, the effects only lasted two hours because of the small amount he absorbed.

But curiosity got the best of him. Unable to shake the feeling that he’d stumbled upon something extraordinary, Hofmann decided to take a measured dose of LSD three days later, on April 19, 1943. It was 250 mg, to be precise. But that turned out to be a huge dose by modern psychedelic standards.

Hofmann’s famous bicycle trip

Hofmann decided to ride his bicycle home from his laboratory while experiencing the full effects of LSD. Soon enough, the roads began to breathe, the colors shimmered, and strange entities appeared. Hofmann painted a horrifying picture of this trip in his 1979 autobiography, “LSD, My Problem Child.”

“Everything in my field of vision wavered and was distorted as if seen in a curved mirror. I also had the sensation of being unable to move from the spot. Nevertheless, my assistant later told me that we had traveled very rapidly.”

When he could no longer see straight, Hofmann asked his assistant to help him get home. Since wartime Basel had banned cars, they went by bicycle. The trip became the stuff of legend, and April 19, 1943, is now celebrated as “Bicycle Day.” After arriving home and getting checked by a doctor, the fear and paranoia had faded. It was replaced by a rather blissful state of being.

“Kaleidoscopic, fantastic images surged in on me, alternating, variegated, opening and then closing themselves in circles and spirals, exploding in colored fountains, rearranging and hybridizing themselves in constant flux.”

Hofmann reportedly used the drug hundreds of times after this experience. He came to be known as the father of LSD and lived till the age of 102. He famously remarked, “I did not choose LSD. It found and called me.” He advocated for the controlled use of the drug and discouraged recreational use. He passed away in 2008 from a heart attack, but remains immortal in history books.