Looming over Tinseltown the iconic sign — which has drawn untold number of Hollywood wannabes — started its life as a real estate promotion. Los Angeles Times publisher Harry Chandler erected it as an advertisement for his Deluxe Beachwood Canyon subdivision in 1923. At a cost of $21,000, it joined numerous other large-scale real estate signs spread along the hills of Hollywood.

Stop Smiling Magazine has a couple more nuggets of the signs history.