Use of the word "freak" as a slang term to mean stoner or heavy marijuana user

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the word "freak" was used for heavy marijuana smokers (other drugs might be involved as well) in New England boarding schools and as far south as Pennsylvania.

My 16 year old son (public school New Jersey) and 50 year old colleague (public school NY) had never heard the term used.

I believe "freak out" is still used for a bad experience on drugs. But in this case, I mean simply "freak"--without any modifiers

1) Was this term used more widely than in boarding schools 25 years ago? 2) Is it still used anywhere? 3) When was it first used to mean stoner? (BTW "stoner"--a synonym, was not in use in those days, although the verb form "to get stoned" certainly was) 4) When was "stoner" as a noun first used?

Freak was common in the 70s and I was in public school.

"Freak" in slang usage connotes sexual activity or kinky sex. Urban Dictionary

To answer number one: Steely Dan has a song on their album Pretzel Logic called Charlie Freak. The song revolves around a man who sells everything he owns for drugs. So, with this example, we see that the word was used beyond boarding schools. (The album was recorded in New York, 1974.)

EDIT: Added year of song

I can only speak of my own experience as a high schooler in 2 Chicago suburbs from 1969-1973, where “freak” was widely used to mean not just stoners but generally anyone who identified with hippy counterculture as expressed in dress, hair, speech, politics, etc. The term seemed to gradually fade away in the mid seventies as all these manifestations entered the mainstream and no longer functioned as subculture identifiers.