pentru jtm:
There have been many myths and rumors about the origin of 420 (4/20 or 4:20) being associated with marijuana. For example:
Myth #1: 420 is the police code for someone smoking marijuana (nope!)
Myth #2: 420 is the number of active chemical compounds in marijuana (uh-uh, that’s 315)
Myth #3: 4/20 is Adolf Hitler’s birthday (that’s factual but has absolutely nothing to do with today’s celebrations by marijuana enthusiasts)
Myth #4: 420 comes from Bob Dylan’s song “Rainy Day Women #12 & 35”, because 12x35 = 420 and it contains the line “everybody must get stoned” (the math does work but it’s really just a delightful coincidence)
jtm, the actual origin story almost sounds like a myth itself, since it involves a secret code, a treasure map and an iconic rock band. It goes like this…
Back in 1971, a map to a secret crop of marijuana plants landed in the hands of a group of Marin County high school students known as the Waldos (so called because they would hang out at the wall outside of school.) The group started meeting near the school’s statue of Louis Pasteur at the end of the school day, around 4:20, to go searching for the legendary crop (and, one assumes, to partake in some recreational herbage.) So their teachers and parents wouldn’t catch on to what they were doing, they used the code “420-Louis” which ended up being shortened to “420.”
Now the story might have ended there, with Waldos being the only people to ever associate the number 420 with cannabis, if not for the fact the one of the Waldos’ older brothers was friends with Phil Lesh, bassist for the Grateful Dead. Lesh and his bandmates loved the coded term so much that they began using it and it eventually caught on with their fans (aka Deadheads.) In December of 1990, Deadheads in Oakland, CA, created flyers inviting people to smoke marijuana (or, “420”) on April 20th, 1991 at 4:20pm… one of these flyers ended up in the hands of a reporter for High Times magazine who ended up publishing the flyer in 1991 and continued to reference the number. 420 Day was born.
There have been many myths and rumors about the origin of 420 (4/20 or 4:20) being associated with marijuana. For example:
Myth #1: 420 is the police code for someone smoking marijuana (nope!)
Myth #2: 420 is the number of active chemical compounds in marijuana (uh-uh, that’s 315)
Myth #3: 4/20 is Adolf Hitler’s birthday (that’s factual but has absolutely nothing to do with today’s celebrations by marijuana enthusiasts)
Myth #4: 420 comes from Bob Dylan’s song “Rainy Day Women #12 & 35”, because 12x35 = 420 and it contains the line “everybody must get stoned” (the math does work but it’s really just a delightful coincidence)
jtm, the actual origin story almost sounds like a myth itself, since it involves a secret code, a treasure map and an iconic rock band. It goes like this…
Back in 1971, a map to a secret crop of marijuana plants landed in the hands of a group of Marin County high school students known as the Waldos (so called because they would hang out at the wall outside of school.) The group started meeting near the school’s statue of Louis Pasteur at the end of the school day, around 4:20, to go searching for the legendary crop (and, one assumes, to partake in some recreational herbage.) So their teachers and parents wouldn’t catch on to what they were doing, they used the code “420-Louis” which ended up being shortened to “420.”
Now the story might have ended there, with Waldos being the only people to ever associate the number 420 with cannabis, if not for the fact the one of the Waldos’ older brothers was friends with Phil Lesh, bassist for the Grateful Dead. Lesh and his bandmates loved the coded term so much that they began using it and it eventually caught on with their fans (aka Deadheads.) In December of 1990, Deadheads in Oakland, CA, created flyers inviting people to smoke marijuana (or, “420”) on April 20th, 1991 at 4:20pm… one of these flyers ended up in the hands of a reporter for High Times magazine who ended up publishing the flyer in 1991 and continued to reference the number. 420 Day was born.
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