This story begins in the little town of Oaklawn, Illinois. The citizens were tired of people ignoring the laws of the road. Namely, not stopping at clearly marked STOP signs. The townsfolk had been complaining to the local law enforcement to crack down on the abusers, but their ploys were left unanswered and the problem persisted.

So, like any good Samaritan, they decided to take matters into their own hands. They needed to find a way to get the drivers attention.

They gathered up about $1,700 in materials, pulled together their own brand of creative thinking and set to work on a way to bring more attention to these signs. What they came up with was several humorous captions to place underneath the original signs.

These captions ranged from:

“STOP: In The Naaaame of Love”

to

“STOP: And Smell The Roses”

to

“STOP: Right There Pilgrim”

to

“STOP: Really. You Gotta Stop”

to

“STOP: Billion Dollar Fine”

The townsfolk traveled around to nearly fifty signs and placed their homemade creations below, and went back home feeling mighty proud of themselves for taking the problem into their own hands.

Well, it didn’t take long for the Department of Transportation to get wind of this and throw a banana peel into the whole project. It appears that the little town was actually in violation of the federal code that prohibited defaming a stop sign as such. They were told to either take the signs down or they would lose federal funding indefinitely.

With the signs down and local taxpayers free and clear of the responsibility of footing the bill for the project, thankfully 3M was more than happy to step in and pay the cost of the project. They were actually planning on using the signs for a promotional brochure anyway.

So all is well that ends well in the small town of Oaklawn…

THE END