Vic High was house sitting, and instructed specifically not to take anything home… but he did. He confessed to it to the home owner, but had the reasoning that the mother looked sick so he took clones. He was allowed to keep his cut as long as he didn’t go giving it away or selling. This is all what I’ve heard at least. I wouldn’t say his cut is truer to what people know, at least as far as the masses go. Joe’s cut was far more widespread and popularly known.
As I mentioned no one really could ever get out of Joe where he got his. I’ve become friends with Sean who was Joe’s best friend during that time and he didn’t have anything to add as far as where he may have got it. For a while I was misled into thinking perhaps Joe got his cut directly from my father. Jorge Cervantes did an interview and said Joe grew up in California and his parents owned a nursery. My pops had a young kid named Joe that always helped him out at the nursery he went to. Someone sent me the Jorge interview info and said it might be a connection… so I assumed it was and shared that info. After meeting Sean I was informed that Jorge made that part of the interview up, probably in an effort to protect Joe who ended up shortly after getting prosecuted anyhow. So Joe’s source remains a mystery, but it was certainly from the same circle of old growers that Vic knew and that my father was friends with.
I’d say Joe’s cut and anything derived from that is closest to what most people know… but a lot of Canadian growers know Romulan as the complex, pepper, spicy, dank pine that is what the original had. That’s what mine has and what I genuinely feel sets Romulan apart from other cultivars. The taste is so specifically unique to Romulan. But it also has some serious medical benefits. I’m off of some very heavy doses of nerve blockers because of Romulan. I’ve had Vietnam vets tell me my Romulan got them back to a full night’s sleep… it was made by vets for our specific issues and the people who worked on it truly did the world a huge favor in my eyes.