Bing Crosby

[Johnny]

"Louis Armstrong's influence on Bing extended to his love of marijuana, which he alternately called mezz (after Mezz Mezzrow), gage, pot, or muggles. Bing didn't develop the lifelong appetite for it that Louis did, but he enjoyed it in the early days--it was legal--and, like Louis, surprised interviewers in the 1960s and 1970s by suggesting it be decriminalized, to set it apart from more harmful and addictive drugs. Bing's eldest son, Gary, argued that pot had a lasting effect on his father's style: 'If you look at the way he sang and the way he walked and talked, you could make a pretty good case for somebody who was loaded. He said to me one time when he was really mad, ranting and raving about my heavy drinking, he said, "Oh that fucking booze. It killed your mother. Why don't you just smoke shit?" That was all he said but there were other times when marijuana was mentioned and he'd get a smile on his face. He'd kind of think about it and there'd be that little smile.'"

Source: G. Giddins, Bing Crosby: A Pocketful of Dreams, 2001, Little Brown & Co. (Boston) page 181