Roach asked me to tell the tale again so we have accurate information.
It was in 1993 or 94. I was out in Gold River CA, a suburb of Sacramento known for million dollars houses and auto junkyards.
I'd just started my cactus obsession. I had a PC and maybe a couple more.
At that point most of information. Came from vendors catalogs and lots of bad info got circulated. Once it was in one tfe others took it for gospel. One bad fact was " t peruvianus is 10x stronger than any other trichos"
Another was "saguaro is tfd fastest growing cactus". An inch a year isn't that fast.
So I walked into a Lumberjack home improvement store and headed to the garden dept.
Right there was a big cactus, 5 fat stems with wicked spines. But I could see that it looked a lot like my San Pedros, just fatter and spined.
I don't remember what their label said, I think it just said cactus. It was $50 so I took it home.
Still not knowing what it was I booked a bunch up with lemon juice added. This one time I evaporated it down to tar. I ate some and I knew right away it was way more active than the PC I'd been using. I named it t lumberjackious ( fake Latin) later shortened to t lumberjack.
At that point I think I got on line with my first computer and started learning. I found other vendors and started a garden.
A few years later, after we moved our whole scene including 200 cacti to our new house
I hooked up with Jethro ( now from Cactus Affinity) and he came up for a visit. We traded a bunch of stuff and he really honed in on the Jack. I gave him a big fat cutting and he did a whole Johnny Appleseed thing with it. Got it into a lot if collections really fast. People loved it then and love it now. Grows fast and big and is undeniably active. And it's a pretty good looking too.
It's gratifying to see it everywhere. Not sure how much credit I deserve for it. Best guess it's an Altman's Pach and bridgessi cross.
It's made it into a number of cactus books. Some had the story wrong and I've tried to straighten it out.
But I'm not an ethnobotanist and I didnt find it in the mountains of Peru. Just a hippie gardener who got really lucky. I think what my contribution was talking a chance on something I didn't really know.
I'm so glad it's so valued.