knock off tha extras weirdo
Starts around 1955, when being spotted with a tattoo meant one of two things: "Were you in the Navy, or were you in jail?" jokes
Don Ed Hardy, the literal don of California body culture.
People could tell if you got your ink on shore leave or in
San Quentin. Sailor tattoos sprung from
Long Beach's Pike, a stretch of pier with six tattoo shops selling 20-minute, four-color tattoos for $15 a pop. When the boats came in, the parlors would stay open for three days cranking out anchors, roses and hearts. Don't ask for a design that's not on the wall — hell, don't even ask to change your flower from red to yellow.
That year, Ed Hardy was 10, too young to even enter a tattoo shop, but pier legend
Bert Grimm snuck him in to watch him work. After high school, Hardy headed north. "In the '60s in the Bay Area, there was this whole thing about freedom and personal liberation," he says. "To me, tattooing was part of that."