On the second floor of Leavenworth Hall going toward the faculty offices, you will find an office at the end of the long hallway about the size of an efficiency kitchen filled with a couple of Beatles posters, cannabis posters and a wall filled with books.

In this office you will find an older, slim gentleman wearing a sweater vest with a button-up shirt underneath, some kakis, and comfortable looking slip-on shoes who has a passion for music and the history of the counterculture of the 1960s-70s.

Like many in the boomer generation, this man began consuming cannabis while in high school and he has been a proponent of legalization since that time.

He is Phil Lamy, a sociology professor at VTSU Castleton, one of the creators of the university’s cannabis program and a drummer in a band.

Lamy is a multifaceted man who some would call “a professor’s professor,” said VTSU Castleton colleague and bandmate Brendan Lalor.

Lamy is also a married man who has been married to his wife Whitney for 43 years. They have two daughters along with three grandchildren who Lamy loves to spend time with.

When he is not failing at getting his grandchildren to watch Looney Toons cartoons, a normal day for Lamy consists of teaching part-time at VTSU Castleton, where he has been for 33 years.

He is 69 years old and is easing into retirement. Instead of full retirement, he chose the option to step down from full-time teaching for half the pay. He no longer must attend meetings, but he can continue to do what he loves in the classroom for as long as he can.

Lamy teaches a sociology and anthropology courses as well as classes in the hotel resort management program in Killington.

He also manages the Cannabis Studies Certificate program at VTSU Castleton, which he launched with Lalor in 2019.

The program has been a hit with students, with slots filling quickly. Some students who were not able to get in the class even “came and sat on the floor just to be in class,” he said.

He also teaches the Cannabis, Culture and Consciousness class, which consists of him giving lectures about detailed historical accounts of cannabis. He is passionate about educating everyone on cannabis.

VTSU Castleton student Carly Centeno, who has taken this course, recalls Lamy as a “super chill guy” who was able to captivate in class and who cares a lot about what he was teaching.

“And it shows,” Centeno said.

Lamy is open and not embarrassed to discuss his cannabis use and experiences.

“Drinking and smoking ages are too high, no pun intended,” Lamy said with a chuckle.

Lamy has been blazing since he was in high school during the counterculture era of the late 60s and early 70s, which took hold of him like it did with many others.

“I have always consumed cannabis,” Lamy said casually, adding that these days, he even grows his own.

Lamy is so passionate about educating people on cannabis that he was even a part of the 2015 Vermont debate on it. He fought all the false information about it, like it being addictive. Through his efforts and efforts of others, it led to the legalization of marijuana in the state of Vermont.

But cannabis is not the only thing that Lamy is passionate about.

Music consumes him and he’s a huge Beatles fan, which stems from his childhood.

Lamy was born in 1955 in Salem, Massachusetts, known to others as the witch city. He grew up with his mother and father, who were both musicians, and seven other siblings.

“My father forced us to learn how to play,” said Lamy, who has been playing drums from an early age and played in the family band called the Lamy Family Entertainers. He and he brothers later broke off to form the Lamy Brothers Band.

But Lamy was different, and also played sports while he was in school, which kind of made him feel like a little bit of an outsider from the band as they were all focused solely on music.

But while sports are no longer part of his life, he still plays the drums every day.

“I can’t play basketball. I can’t even run, but I can still play drums,” Lamy said jokingly.

His musical inspirations and favorite bands include Earth, Wind, and Fire, The Beatles, Chicago, Steely Dan and the Doobie Brothers.

Lamy’s passion for music also took him to many places including two semesters in London, where he played music, and to Cuba, where he got to see buskers perform and where he studied Afro-Cuban music and Latin percussion.

You can now find Lamy playing with fellow colleagues Andre Fleche and Brendan Lalor in a band called the Green Brothers Band. They play local venues including Castleton’s Third Place.

“When the singer stepped out, I stepped in,” Lalor said.

Lalor sees Lamy as an encouraging person who “puts wind in the sail of things.”

Through playing in a band together, a friendship has been formed between Lamy and Lalor and Lalor said he considers him “the closest thing to a brother at Castleton.”

Lalor met Lamy in 2008 when he began teaching at VTSU Castleton. He joined the band in 2014 after the old singer stepped down.

Fleche, a civil rights and U.S. history professor and the guitarist of the band, has been at VTSU Castleton since 2006 and has been playing guitar since he was 14. But he didn’t start playing seriously again until 2020 after COVID struck.

Fleche sees Lamy as a wise mentor and knew he was a talented musician as well as a gifted drummer. Fleche feels as though he has been able to grow as a musician since he has known Lamy.

Fleche asked Lamy if he wanted to play sometime, and this led to Fleche becoming the band’s guitarist and through their shared interest in music it led to them becoming friends with Lamy.

Lamy is “a good friend in general,” he said.

By day Lamy is a professor who loves to educate others about sociology, anthropology and marijuana. By night, he’s a gifted drummer of the Green Brothers and avid partaker of the devil’s lettuce.

As “mini lectures” can begin anytime, Lalor said, you can be sure that the professor’s professor will leave you with a lasting impression as well as a little bit of a contact high if you’re lucky enough.