Political Posters
Sunset Strip Riots 1966
Circa 1967 Sunset Strip Riots poster capturing youth clashes at Pandora’s Box, the curfew crackdown, and the unrest that inspired For What It’s Worth.
Political Posters
$4,000
ONE AVAILABLE
Shipping and handling are included in the purchase price.
Piece Details
This is the only available piece. Once purchased, it will no longer be offered in the Delickedly storefront.
Offered only after review for originality, condition, presentation, and alignment with the Delickedly quality standard.
Sunset Strip Riots 1966
One of the first notable moments of civil unrest of the sort that would come to mark so much of the 1960s occurred in Los Angeles, along the fabled stretch of Sunset Boulevard in what became known as the Sunset Strip Riots. The clashes between college kids and the police were triggered in part by restless college-aged kids congregating at clubs like Pandora’s Box, while local businesses and residents along The Strip pushed authorities to crack down. When the Los Angeles City Council announced a curfew along The Strip, protests escalated into a flashpoint on November 12, 1966, when thousands of young Americans gathered at Pandora’s Box near the intersection of Sunset Boulevard and Crescent Heights Boulevard.
This was the Sam Yorty era in LA, and he had not developed the name “Mad Sam Yorty” for nothing. The riot squad was sent in to clear the streets in a wild melee, but the unrest would flare up and continue for weeks to come. The riots inspired Stephen Stills to pen “For What It’s Worth” for Buffalo Springfield, and numerous other artists wrote about the Sunset Strip Riots, including Joni Mitchell, The Mamas & The Papas, and The Monkees, among others.
Graphic artists operating underground also responded to the riots, and this unique poster was created circa early 1967 as a photo-montage from images captured by various photographers who covered the street clashes. This original poster was likely sold through small retail shops that catered to the emerging counterculture, as well as by street vendors looking to cash in on the chaos surrounding the events on The Strip.
Pandora’s Box, which can be seen in some of the photos included on the poster, was demolished by the city in the summer of 1967. Other notable aspects of the poster include some of the people visible in the hodgepodge of photos that make up the piece, including a very young Rodney Bingenheimer, who would go on to rock ’n’ roll fame through his KROQ radio show and his presence among the LA rock scene, eventually earning the nickname Mayor of the Sunset Strip.
Dimensions: Seventeen inches horizontally, Twenty-two inches vertically (17 x 22”)
Condition: Good, with some very minor age ware.
