Between the soil and the sun of Anderson Valley sits Sugar Hill Farm, a piece of sacred land that’s home to Rosemary Roberts. Her deep passion for gardening turned the farm into a florist’s dream. Roses, magnolias and peonies for days; Sugar Hill Farm is the sweetest place on earth.

Before cannabis became the cream of the crop across the country, it was cultivated on the farm Rosemary built. In the early 1980s, Rosemary planted her first cannabis seeds. Then by the time Proposition 215 came to pass in 1996, Rosemary’s boys encouraged her to stake a claim in the medical cannabis industry - which she did. After much trial and error, she succeeded. Her passion for gardening blossomed into a legacy as rich and pure as the cannabis she has crafted for decades.

Named after ‘Sugar,’ Rosemary’s childhood nickname, Sugar Hill Farm is widely respected for growing and distributing the finest cannabis in California. For years, Sugar Hill Farm and its beloved groundkeeper supported surrounding legacy farms and the state’s medical cannabis program until she passed the tradition on to her son Jim Roberts.

From there blossomed The Bohemian Chemist, an herbal apothecary designed masterfully by Jim to truly resemble Rosemary’s southern roots.

As a close friend and proud partner of ours at ONA.Life, it is our privilege to honor the work and legacy of Rosemary and Sugar Hill Farm. Decades of cannabis prohibition created invisible heroes like Rosemary, a trailblazer for women in the cannabis industry and beyond. This is why we use our platform to highlight the important legacy Rosemary and many others created so the rest of us can flourish.

To help understand the passion and motivation behind Rosemary’s craft, we were fortunate to sit down with her son and current overseer of Sugar Hill Farm, Jim, to discuss her impact on California’s cannabis scene and the trails she has blazed for over six decades to create opportunities for others.

You and your brother challenged Rosemary to grow cannabis while you were in high school. Can you tell us more about how that conversation went?

It was, other than a few of her friends partaking in the 60s in California. I was pretty open about cannabis during high school and college in the 80s. I grew a couple of plants in the closet at one time in an old guest house we had at the property at one time. She had a fairly liberal viewpoint on cannabis. Her viewpoint was “I don't mind you doing this but don't do it at other places or go out driving.”

There was a point when my brother and I really wanted to grow cannabis plants. My mom was an avid gardener and loved to grow plants. She loves a challenge. We had a property in Southern California in an older historic part of town where farmers lived. She decided to go ahead and grow these cannabis plants and they were monstrous; they were over 8 feet tall. But we didn’t quite get them completely to harvest because we started hearing helicopters so they went down in the middle of the night.

But ever since, she’s never had a negative view of cannabis. There are really two reasons why she developed a passion for growing cannabis. One, she loves a challenge. And the second is that she had rheumatoid arthritis and the plants here in Anderson valley were mainly being grown for medicinal reasons. She was using a cannabis extraction technique to make a balm and treat her pain.

Was cannabis an effective treatment for her rheumatoid arthritis?

It was absolutely an effective treatment. I think we actually will get back into that. One of her really good friends was going through chemotherapy and developed neuropathy in her feet. She tried different products from dispensaries, but Rosemary’s balm was the best.

How has Rosemary’s resilience helped her build a cannabis farm from scratch?

I think at first she really didn’t have a full ins-and-outs of growing. Lots of trial by error. But in our area, given our culture, we were not alone in this. Plus, she just loved growing it. She loved the experience of having the biggest plants. She had bragging rights with how well she did.

She grew up in the south - Alabama. When she was 14, she ran away from her abusive father to Florida. Her brothers came and got her and brought her back and she ran away again. That was just a part of who she was. She’s a bit of an outlaw. I call her a maverick.

She was also picked on as a middle child and told that she wouldn’t amount to much. That builds spirit. When you feel like your father is trying to break you, you have to prove yourself and you can do something. I think that spirit has carried her throughout her life. From there, she’s really had no fear as far as trailblazing. That goes right into cannabis too.

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Rosemary Roberts had an extensive show business background and even competed in Miss Universe as Miss Florida

What other plants are on Sugar Hill Farm?

She always wanted to have a place that was a bit rural. That was her upbringing. She was raised by a farming family with very little means. The idea of being able to have a property out in the country and grow everything she wanted to grow was a dream of hers. We started off with 160 acres and scaled down to something more manageable.

On Sugar Hill Farm, she has an orchard, over 500 rose bushes, ranunculi, peonies - it’s a beautiful property. It’s extensive, a lot of the plants are things that do well in this area. Cannabis is just one small part of the cultivation on the property.

Did you ever think you would inherit the farm?

Well, I had my own property that eventually became commercial. She really wanted the property to continue. We’re stewards of the property we feel. We definitely left our imprint on it. We have to carry on the tradition so it can be kept in the family. It’s been wonderful to keep it going. When someone spends so much of themselves on something, it’s nice to pass it on.

The compliance part was hard. She wasn’t having fun anymore with the compliance side of things. Once you get laws that really come down on you, the heart and soul of it was gone.

I think she definitely felt that and wanted to rest. I was thinking, “okay maybe we can do something else with the property.” And she said, “No, no, I still want it to be grown here.”

And that’s when I came in and took over.

Where did the nickname Sugar come from?

That was a widely debated nickname within the family. That was her nickname growing up. She loves sweets, so it probably came from her love of sweets. Her siblings would say it was because she was so sweet coming up. But growing up, my cousins would always call her aunt sugar. That was always her nickname she got growing up in the south. We carried it on and it was my idea that we named the property Sugar Hill Farm.

What life advice has she given you?

Failure is not an option. She came from a place with a lot of grit and tenacity and a lot of that has been instilled in us. She’s always encouraged us to go out and do whatever we want to do. She came from a design background and did all she wanted there, and when it was time to retire, she channeled her tenacity into Sugar Hill Farm.

Has Rosemary's design background influenced you?

Yes, as a kid, she would drag me to antique auctions in LA all the time. It’s always something I had a lot of exposure to at a young age. She has definitely been an influence on me.

What is her influence like for other women in or wanting to get into cannabis?

I think what people latch onto with her is that she started this at such a late age in her life. She started about 40 years, but to pick it back up in her 70s and to actually be growing through that period until she was 90 - it’s inspirational. She’s proved that there’s such a space for women in cannabis.

Here [in cannabis], there are so many women that are trailblazing the industry. For them to see someone my mom's age tending to her plants - it’s a huge inspiration. It shows them that this is something they can do too. It’s inspiring with all the battles going on in cannabis.

What would you want to share about your mother?

Most of all, I think she’s an amazing person. As she gets closer to the end of her life, we feel so fortunate to be a part of those years and let her age in place on this farm. For us, that’s a real blessing. She’s had such a huge impact on all four of her kids.