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Coronado High
Nobody would’ve figured the kids from the sleepy beach town of Coronado, California, for criminal masterminds. They were just some hippie surfers, high school friends who’d come up with the idea of swimming bundles of marijuana across the border from Tijuana during the summer of 1969. Within a decade, however, the Coronado Company had become the largest pot-smuggling operation on the West Coast, a $100 million empire with outposts from Mexico to Morocco to Thailand. And sitting at the top of it all was the most improbable of kingpins: Lou Villar, a former Spanish teacher and swimming coach at Coronado High School. In the classroom, Villar had told his students to steer clear of drugs. Now he was working with them to move thousands of kilos of the stuff.
Drawing on exclusive interviews with Villar and his partners in crime, Joshuah Bearman—author of the Wired article that became the film “Argo”—tells the inside story of the Coronado Company’s unlikely rise and the intrepid DEA agents who brought its principals to justice. “Coronado High” is an epic saga of daring escapades, hedonistic excess, and friendships betrayed, played out across the era when the innocence of the Summer of Love curdled into the paranoia of the Drug War.
Drawing on exclusive interviews with Villar and his partners in crime, Joshuah Bearman—author of the Wired article that became the film “Argo”—tells the inside story of the Coronado Company’s unlikely rise and the intrepid DEA agents who brought its principals to justice. “Coronado High” is an epic saga of daring escapades, hedonistic excess, and friendships betrayed, played out across the era when the innocence of the Summer of Love curdled into the paranoia of the Drug War.
70 pages, ebook
First published July 10, 2013
12 people are currently reading
363 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
November 7, 2013
You can cop this as a mini ebook from Amazon, or you might be able to read this for free at the Atavist. (I guess, theoretically, you could just subscribe to the Atavist, if you're a rich nerd). The author is the same guy who wrote the Wired story the movie Argo is based, along with a few other articles that are passed around on the Internets on the reg, for the purposes of conspicuous #longreads consumption.
If only chicks would bang you based on the amount of time you spend staring at an ereader. I'd be set.
Coronado High is the story of a late '60s-era high school Spanish teacher and a few random stoners on an island off San Diego who start bringing weed over the border from nearby Mexico, and the next thing you know they're running this huge, ridonkulously convoluted (involving all kinds of vehicles and communication technology out of a '70s James Bond film), ridonkulously lucrative drug smuggling ring.
Truth be told, it's not that much of a story. If you've read one of these stories about the takedown of a big drug organization, you've read them all. Eventually, someone gets picked up doing something stupid and ends up ratting out everyone else.
The thing that sets Coronado high apart is the description of some of the bizarre, increasingly complex schemes they used to sneak shit into the states, and the "hood rich" lifestyle these guys were living once the money started rolling in. They were the white equivalent of the circa 2000 Big Tymers. It really is a fun read. I'd recommend it to people who like to read and watch movies about drug dealers.
If only chicks would bang you based on the amount of time you spend staring at an ereader. I'd be set.
Coronado High is the story of a late '60s-era high school Spanish teacher and a few random stoners on an island off San Diego who start bringing weed over the border from nearby Mexico, and the next thing you know they're running this huge, ridonkulously convoluted (involving all kinds of vehicles and communication technology out of a '70s James Bond film), ridonkulously lucrative drug smuggling ring.
Truth be told, it's not that much of a story. If you've read one of these stories about the takedown of a big drug organization, you've read them all. Eventually, someone gets picked up doing something stupid and ends up ratting out everyone else.
The thing that sets Coronado high apart is the description of some of the bizarre, increasingly complex schemes they used to sneak shit into the states, and the "hood rich" lifestyle these guys were living once the money started rolling in. They were the white equivalent of the circa 2000 Big Tymers. It really is a fun read. I'd recommend it to people who like to read and watch movies about drug dealers.
October 23, 2013
Worth a read! Longform article about San Diego slackers who built a drug smuggling empire, somehow the author managed to talk to them all years later and piece together a story that I'm sure will be a movie someday.
April 27, 2015
Typical drug smuggling story. Nothing too unique. Not particularly well written. For some reason he skipped over what would've been some interesting stories. There are better smuggling books out there (The Last Pirate).
July 11, 2017
Sure, it was a pretty amazing true story, but the book's just not that entertaining overall. Not the best when it comes to the True Crime genre.
October 14, 2018
quick read
this was a pretty good book. quick read. I had no idea about these guys and it seemed like something good to read. lots of people to follow, but not overly compicated.
this was a pretty good book. quick read. I had no idea about these guys and it seemed like something good to read. lots of people to follow, but not overly compicated.
March 6, 2017
Coronado High is a short (75 pages) true-crimce story about West Coast pot smuggling in the 70s and 80s. I read to reasearch a story I'm writing. The writing was crisp. The intracacies of their operation and the wealth they amassed are fascinating.
September 5, 2014
This book was exceptionally well researched and written. But what was missing for me was a sense of the rush that was propelling these guys. While it was faithful to the facts of the story, it lacked insight into the emotional thrill.
October 8, 2014
I really enjoyed reading this! It's a short and easy read but very interesting. I did not know this was written by the same gentleman who wrote what the movie Argo was based off of. Very well researched and just a great story!
September 21, 2016
Vivid portrayals of characters, accurate and clear accounts of sophisticated operations. Josh Bearman truly commands his story. The sympathy for the Company is the only thing that disturbs me a little bit; I cannot help suspecting that Lou's charm has swept the author off his feet.
August 28, 2013
excellent!
February 20, 2015
Very engaging at first, but dragged on a bit too much from the middle on out. Too many characters to remember.
March 15, 2014
If you have ver wondered what it would be like to be a drug smuggler at the dawn of the war on drugs, this is a must read.
July 6, 2016
Interesting
Quick read (regional airline flight-ish) about a quickly escalating phenomena. Will definitely make a good movie. Lot of names thrown out early, take note.
Quick read (regional airline flight-ish) about a quickly escalating phenomena. Will definitely make a good movie. Lot of names thrown out early, take note.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews