New Year's Prank Alters Iconic LA 'HOLLYWOOD' Sign to Read 'HOLLYWeeD'
The city of Los Angeles woke up to a new year on Sunday to find its iconic "HOLLYWOOD" sign on the side of Mount Lee altered to read "HOLLYWeeD".
The apparent New Year's Eve prank was executed by a lone individual who altered the two Os in the 450-foot-long sign to read as Es with the help of banners, one bearing a peace sign and the other a heart.
The vandal, dressed in all black, was recorded by security cameras in Griffith Park around 3 a.m. on Sunday morning. But the police are unable to identify the suspect because it was dark and raining, said Sgt. Guy Juneau of the Los Angeles Police Department's Security Services division, speaking to the LA Times.
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Park rangers restored the sign to read "HOLLYWOOD" around 11 a.m. on Sunday as tourists and locals snapped photos of the altered lettering from nearby vantage points.
The LAPD has stated that the vandal, if arrested, will only be facing misdemeanor trespassing charges as the sign was not damaged.
There are suggestions that the prank was perpetrated as an homage to California's recent legalization of the recreational use of marijuana.
This isn't the first time that the iconic sign has been altered to read "HOLLYWeeD". On Jan 1. 1976 Daniel Finegood, a Cal State Northridge student, perpetuated the same prank for an art class assignment. New Year's Day 1976 happened to be the first day that California classified possession of up to one ounce of marijuana as a misdemeanor, rather than a felony.
Editing the sign has become a way for Angelenos to express themselves over the past few decades, with Daniel Finegood himself being responsible for carrying out three more alterations after his first one in 1976.
Finegood changed the sign to read "Holywood" in 1987 to mark Pope John Pual II's visit to "Ollywood" during the Iran-Contra hearings in protest of then-Marine Lt. Col. Oliver North, who sold arms to Iran; and to "Oil War" in 1990 to protest the Persian Gulf War, reports the Huffington Post. The sign was also changed in 1992 and most recently in 2010 by other unidentified persons.
The frequent occurrence of unauthorized changes being made to the sign prompted city officials to secure the area with a fence, alarms and a surveillance system to dissuade such antics in the future.
However, the latest perpetrator seems to have carried out his prank without being hampered or detected by the security measures around the sign.
