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Business cards, Acid Test membership cards created by author Ken Kesey and his group, the Merry Pranksters, in 1965 and 1966.
Key Details
Design: The front of the card features a pointing Uncle Sam, parodying the classic "I Want You" U.S. Army recruiting poster, with the text "Can You Pass the Acid Test?".
Purpose: These cards were distributed at the "Acid Tests," a series of parties held by the Merry Pranksters in California. These events were a key part of the mid-1960s counterculture movement and featured music, light shows, and the use of LSD, which was legal at the time. The house band for many of these events was the Grateful Dead.
The "Acid Test": The term "acid test" itself predates these events, originally referring to a way to determine if a metal was real gold. Metaphorically, it means a conclusive or rigorous test of a person's character or the value of something. In the context of the Merry Pranksters, it was a challenge to see if people could handle the experience of the psychedelic parties. |
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