When I first visited Hollywood, the main thing I wanted to see was the Hollywood sign. It seems to epitomize what Hollywood is actually about – it’s huge, looms over the city like the entertainment business, and very prominent. It also seems like it has been there forever and is indestructible, but let me tell you a little about this history of the Hollywood sign.
Some people don’t know this, but the sign actually read Hollywoodland when it was constructed in 1923. That was to be the name of the posh new neighborhood being created there. Several of the real estate investors decided that they would build the sign to advertise their new neighborhood. Each letter was 50 feet tall and 30 feet wide. Originally, the letters were lit with 4,000 20-watt lightbulbs that would first display “Holly”, then “wood”, then “land.” There was even a caretaker to replace the bulbs. The sign was only supposed to be there for only two years. However, the investment company went bankrupt during the Great Depression and there was no money to pay the caretaker, much less tear the sign down, so it remained. By 1939, the residents were complaining that the sign was decrepit and lowering their property value. In 1944, the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce took over the sign and the land that it was on, but the tin used to make the letters continued to deteriorate. When the H fell over in 1949, the Commerce decided to restore the sign. They removed the “land” part, just leaving the now famous “Hollywood” sign.
By the early 70s, the Hollywood sign was again suffering from wear and tear. In the late 70s, the Hollywood Sign Trust was formed to help restore it once more. They decided to “sell” the letters to raise the needed restoration funds. Celebrities such as Gene Autry, Hugh Hefner, and Alice Cooper bought letters for $28,000 each. The old tin letters were torn down and replaced with steel letters, which are just sturdier. The sign has only been lit for special occasions in the last 25 years.