In the wake of the 1961 New York negotiations, control agencies assumed matters would proceed in a routine manner for the foreseeable future. Few anticipated the surprises around the corner. The depth of Harry Anslinger’s antipathy to the Single Convention, nor to what extremes he would go to defeat it, was not yet apparent. Yet even Anslinger’s machinations paled in the face of an unprecedented onslaught of drug abuse. In the decade after the 1961 conference, national and international control arrangements underwent massive changes. States created new organizations to grapple with the situation, while some venerable institutions did not survive.