'420' and Marijuana Urban Legends

420 is not the number of a bill in Congress to legalize pot, though many people believe it is.

420 is not the police or penal code for marijuana possession in California or any other state, though many people believe that, as well.

Nor is 420 is the number of chemical compounds in cannabis, though many authors seem fond of stating so.

What "420" is -- whether expressed in the form 4:20 (as a time of day), 4/20 (as a calendar date), or just the unadorned numeral itself (pronounced "four-twenty") -- is a universal symbol, of sorts, for the use and appreciation of marijuana. In fact, 4/20 (April 20) is widely, though unofficially, known as Marijuana Appreciation Day.

Notwithstanding all the urban legends that have grown up about the 420/marijuana connection, the true story behind it is surprisingly prosaic. In the early 1970s a small group of hippie stoners at San Rafael High School in northern California used to meet at a designated location every day to smoke pot at 4:20 p.m. They did this so regularly that among members of the group "420" became a general euphemism for lighting up. The catchphrase spread beyond the immediate group, beyond the high school, and ultimately beyond California, so that within a decade or two pot smokers were using it across the country and indeed the world over.
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It was something I wondered about and today I walked into the answer accidentally... Yey, I learnedd something new today!

-- Edited by LGigolo at 11:46, 2008-04-29