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It is a simple, direct, unpretentious symbol: just four lines (in the shape of a hay fork) inside a circle. It was created just gone fifty years ago by the designer and artist Gerald Holtom, who did not think that it would become a universal symbol of peace.

A graduate of the Royal College of Art in London, Holtom thought up the design in 1958 as a commission for the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND), which was set up the same year amid fears of a possible nuclear conflict (it was the time of the Cold War that divided the world into two blocs: one communist and one capitalist).

Conceived, therefore, as a symbol representing opposition to nuclear arms, Holtom's design did not take long to cross borders. In the United States, during the 1960s, it became the standard of civil-rights demonstrators and of opponents of the Vietnam War. It became identified with the counterculture hippy movement which advocated love and non-violence. It was then that the Holtom's symbol became a universal protest symbol against the savagery of war.

To commemorate the symbol, the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament has launched a Happy Birthday Peace website inviting everyone to come up with their own re-creation of Holtom's symbol. CND is also about to publish a book entitled 'Peace: 50 Years of Protest', which will include drawings by celebrities from the fields of music, art, politics, etc.