Was this the greatest weed-culture stunt ever pulled in California?

Back in 1976, a lot of things hadn’t happened yet: For one thing, ‘Star Wars’ was yet to be a thing, the internet was still a closed project restricted to researchers, Elvis was still the (living) king and legal access to medical marijuana for the masses was but a distant dream in many US states.

Nonetheless, for those Californians old enough to remember, certain events on 1^st of January 1976 would prove leave a lasting impact, with one stand-out moment in particular being forever burnt in to the collective conscience of a generation…

What happened on 01-01-1976?

• On this fateful day, The Golden State made history by introducing much more relaxed marijuana laws than ever before, which would see the penalties for weed related ‘crimes’ become significantly reduced.
• To celebrate this event, a young artist altered the ‘Hollywood’ sign on Los Angeles’ Mount Lee in a manner which would put a smile on many faces throughout the land…
• The iconic sign would be temporarily transformed in a non-damaging manner, by draping a number of pieces of cloth over two of its letters, resulting in the letters spelling out: ‘Hollyweed’!

How was the Hollywood sign altered?

The artist responsible for the alteration of the Hollywood sign – the late, great Danny Finegood –  would go on record to share just how proud he was of the fact that the sign was not permanently altered or damaged in any way, due to his clever technique of strategically hanging pieces of dark and light cloth over two of the letter ‘O’s in the sign…

Sounds simple enough…

Yes, it might: But scaling the hill and avoiding detection would prove to present their own challenges; In order to make the feat as quick and efficient as possible, the artist enrolled a couple of his buddies, who would each play their part in making the transformation complete.

Today, if anyone felt the need to recreate this stunt, they’d soon find themselves in hot water: The ‘Hollyweed’ artwork would soon be joined with other, politically-motivated attempts, which would later trigger the authorities to install security countermeasures which would make any such attempts incredibly difficult, not to mention dangerous, making the 1976 version stand out as an iconic, fun moment of weed-culture history which will most likely not be replicated in the future without some sort of permission from those responsible for managing the site.

Disclaimer: This article is presented for educational purposes only: The Vault Cannabis Seeds Store encourages all readers to obey their local laws.