How funny,
When I visited relatives outside of Lincoln Ne, I happened to notice the same thing. They had a few acres and the stuff was all over the place.
Being from Southern Oregon, I felt I would share my knowledge on how to care for his crop. Trim the buds back , yank the males or you would have a bunch of seeds, and so forth.
They were nice enough to inform me, after a good laugh from them, that it grew wild, and was exactly like you said polehicker, grown during the war for rope. They also said you could get the best headache if you wanted to smoke it.