Around the world today at 4:20 pm, the marijuana community will celebrate “420,” or National Weed Day, which takes place annually, appropriately on 4/20 — April 20. Another milestone as “Pot Goes Public.”
420 Celebrations
With Colorado and Washington having passed marijuana legalization, and medical marijuana lawful in more then two dozen states, expectations are high for large turnouts in public 420 gatherings everywhere. In 2013, for instance, approximately 15,000 people gathered in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park in appreciation of cannabis.
With marijuana moving into the mainstream and business figures like Virgin Group founder Sir Richard Branson and politicians like California’s Lt. Governor Gavin Newsom advocating for legalization, even President Barack Obama and his Attorney General Eric Holder may soon have to weigh in.
The origins of 420
The naming of National Weed Day is quirky and may be the stuff of urban legend. According to Wikipedia:
A group of teenagers in San Rafael, California, calling themselves the Waldos[4][5][6] began using the term in connection with a plan to search for an abandoned cannabis crop that they had learned about in autumn 1971.[6][7] Although their typical “hang-out spot was a wall outside the school,” the Waldos designated the Louis Pasteur statue on the grounds of San Rafael High School as their meeting place, and 4:20 p.m. as their meeting time.[8] The Waldos referred to this initial plan with the phrase “4:20 Louis”, but after multiple attempts to find the crop failed, the phrase evolved in form and use—shortened simply to “4:20″, the teens increasingly relied on the codeword to refer to pot-smoking in general.[7] High Times, particularly the editor Steven Hager, was responsible for bringing the Waldos story to a national audience.[9] Hager called for 4:20 p.m. to be the socially accepted time of day to consume cannabis and attributed the early spread of the phrase to Grateful Dead followers, who were also linked to the city of San Rafael.[10]
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