In 1975 Anne Lund joins the OOA group in the city of Aarhus. Like many other young people at the time, she wishes to engage in politics, and to her, the question of nuclear power embraces a number of important aspects: How should we organize society? What kind of energy do we want to use? How do we ensure a peaceful society?

»When I joined the Aarhus group we were ony about 10 people. Some of them came from Gyllingnæs south of Aarhus, one of the possible sites for the first Danish nuclear energy plant. «

As early as 1976, the badge was translated into German, English and French, and it was quickly picked up by opponents to nuclear power all over the world. »Right from the start the intention was that the sales profit should be used locally. After a while we decided to make an international foundation, from which some of the profits were used for international information campaigns,« Anne Lund says.

From the year 1978 the International Foundation of the OOA financed the World Information Service on Energy (WISE).
Over the years, the badge has been translated to around 60 languages and distributed in millions of copies. It has been a registered trademark since 1977.

In 1975 Anne Lund joins the OOA group in the city of Aarhus. Like many other young people at the time, she wishes to engage in politics, and to her, the question of nuclear power embraces a number of important aspects: How should we organize society? What kind of energy do we want to use? How do we ensure a peaceful society?

»When I joined the Aarhus group we were ony about 10 people. Some of them came from Gyllingnæs south of Aarhus, one of the possible sites for the first Danish nuclear energy plant. «

»In 1975 it became increasingly clear, that the question, OOA had put until now – “Do you feel safe about nuclear power?” – had had its time. Now, many people were not only skeptical, but against nuclear power. It was important that people could have the opportunity to show this,« Anne Lund states.

In Sweden, Anne had noticed the two different badges of the Swedish anti-nuclear movement. One with a clenched fist, and one with a pregnant woman surrounded by electron orbits.
»At the time, OOA’s colours were yellow and black, just like the colours of nuclear power, and those colours signal danger. … But I thought, no, we don’t want to define ourselves by fear, we want something different. We want a different society, a different way of producing energy. Something warm, something life-giving.«

This thought lead Anne Lund to the sun. »I thought: ‘We all own the sun. It signals solar energy. It makes the wind blow. It should be happy, but say no. ‘No thanks – this is not what we want’.«

Together with another member of the OOA, Anne Lund refines the design to the wellknown result with the sun that says: ‘Nuclear power? No thanks’. And with help from a friend, she sketched the now iconic sun:
»I asked Lene Hvidtfeldt Larsen who was an advertising designer, about how such a sun should look. She then grabbed a piece of paper and drew it, with the characteristic long ray pointing out at one side.«

From there, things speed up. For the May 1st celebration the activists pay for having the first 500 badges made – and they were snatched up like hot cakes, Anne Lund recalls.

»Every Saturday, a number of activists packed recycled polystyrene boxes (which had originally been used for transporting tomatoes for wholesale), and went out to sell Smiling Sun badges and discuss with the public. Walking around with the tomato boxes and selling badges was both a way of spreading the idea, and also promoted our community spirit. I met my husband when we walked about selling badges from the tomato boxes.«

That the Smiling Sun would end up being one of the most famous logos in the world, was nothing that Anne Lund had foreseen. Even so, she nurtured a secret hope that it would reach far:
»While drawing it, I dreamt to myself about how it would be used. I dreamt that it would be used widely, in a large scale on posters and such, but I didn’t mention it to anyone. But suddenly, it happened! Seeing it all over – even when traveling Europe – was an amazing feeling.«

And her goal to create a badge that a nice, middle-aged woman would want to wear, was also achieved. »The first time, I saw it worn by a middle-aged woman in a trench coat, I thought, “Yes! This is it”.«