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Its one of those urban legends, like eating the worm at the bottom of a bottle of mezcal. Drink enough of a 120 proof liquor and just about anyone is likely to have visions. It is a strong herbal liqueur distilled with a wide variety of flavorful herbs. The chlorophyll of the herbs is what gave it a greenish color and hence the nickname "Green Fairy". The contemporary version tends to rely mainly on anise or licorice for its flavor. Apparently that is what Bilko tried. It was actually an earlier version that used wormwood that gave Absinthe its notoriety and was later banned.
It was traditionally served with ice water and a cube of sugar; the sugar cube was placed on a slotted "absinthe spoon", and the water was drizzled over the sugar into the glass of absinthe. The sugar helped take the bitter edge from the absinthe and when the water is drizzled into the the liquor it all turns milky greenish-white (the effect is called "louche").
Some early disreputable distillers cut corners and used some toxic chemicals to mimic the color and the louche effect and that may have been another source for Absinthe's bad rap.
Anyway getting back to wormwood. Wormwood had been used medicinally to exterminate tapeworm infestations while leaving the human host uninjured and even rejuvenated by the experience. At the end of the 18th century, the herb developed a recreational vogue. People discovered they could get high off it. The problem was the means of delivery, as it was unacceptably bitter in taste. BTW, the British in colonial India found a similar way of making the quinine that was used for malaria more palatable. They mixed it with gin.
A Frenchman living in Switzerland found the answer by inventing absinthe, which delivered both the herb and alcohol in a stunningly tart beverage, with a flavor resembling licorice. The most well-known maker of absinthe was French distiller Henri-Louis Pernod. Absinthe would eventually enjoy its greatest popularity in fin-de-siècle Paris, with Vincent Van Gogh, Oscar Wilde and others among its most ardent imbibers. In this country it became especially popular in New Orleans, which makes sense given its franco-european character.
Around the turn of the century, temperance groups started to notice a particularly growing bunch of alcoholics that were "Absinthists" and noted that heavy absinthe users had a propensity toward madness and suicide, by the second decade of this century it became banned in the Western world, unfairly lumped in with opiates, cocaine, and marijuana. One must also consider the contribution of the high alcohol content to "absinthism", as well as the flood of cheap and adulterated products in the market at its heyday. When someone consumes 20 or more glasses a day of a 120-150 proof alcoholic beverage (which were possibly contaminated with toxic metals as well), it can tend to have a deleterious effect on them.
After its banning, imitations, using anise and other legal herbs in place of wormwood, appeared. The most well-known is contemporary Pernod, which was originally the best and most famous brand of absinthe; it's still made today but the similarity is only in color and brand-name.
Regarding the issue of thujone content in absinthe (which some less than scrupulous makers tout as a reason to buy their brand) ... thujone from wormwood herb is present in absinthe, but in such trace amounts that by the time you consumed a toxic dose you'd be dead of alcohol poisoning, many times over. Apparently the distillation process removes most if not all of the toxicity of the wormwood in well-made absinthe; that, plus its trace amounts in the elixir, make absinthe -- consumed responsibly, as any strong spirit -- perfectly safe. Additionally, wormwood is also one of the herbs used (in trace amounts) to make that flavored wine and essential Martini ingredient that we all know as vermouth. The name of the drink comes from the German wermuth, which means wormwood.
I'll throw one more thing in here. If you really want to talk about the crazy things people eat and drink you should do a google on "fugu" or specially prepared pufferfish that they serve in Japan (and only 2 restaurants in the US). It has to be cooked by specially trained chefs. If it is overcooked, it is just regular fish. If its undercooked, it will either kill you or put you into a deathlike coma (which is why they always wait several days before burying anyone that dies after eating fugu in Japan).If it is cooked just right it supposedly produces a pleasant numbing sensation in your mouth. And that's no urban legend.
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