Happy Throwback Thursday! Today our throwback year is 1970, the year the recycling symbol was introduced! In 1970, the Container Corporation of America, a large producer of recycled paperboard, sponsored a contest for art and design students at high schools and colleges all over the country to raise awareness for environmental issues. The competition was in honor of the first Earth Day, with was April 22 that same year. The contest had over 500 submissions. The winner was a 23-year-old college student at the University of Southern California, Gary Anderson. He was awarded a $2500 scholarship and his design went into the public domain. He’s said that it only took him a day or 2 to come up with the design, and that he got the idea for it while watching paper being fed into a printer. Today, it’s one of the most recognizable symbols in the world and has been called one of America’s “most important design icons”. Learn more in the audio below!