Wanted: Dead Heads and Pot Heads

Nov. 16, 2009— -- Dead heads and pot heads take note. While the straight economy goes up in smoke with double digit unemployment, job prospects for hippies are booming -- and not just for boomers.

At the University of California at Santa Cruz (UCSC) they're looking to hire an official Grateful Dead archivist.

And in Denver, where Colorado's medical marijuana industry is legally flourishing, there are these two recent job postings:

The alternative newspaper Westword is advertising for a pot reviewer, asking for a short essay from applicants on "What Marijuana Means to Me".

Similarly, a new biotech company, Full Spectrum Laboratories, needs scientists to test the potency of cannabis samples and salesmen to market their quality-control tools.

They don't call it the Mile High City for nothing.

Those doing the hiring say -- not surprisingly -- they are being inundated with applications.

UCSC has so far received more than 100 applications for an archivist to organize a collection for an interactive reading room at the McHenry Library, tentatively named Dead Central, which will feature non- stop Grateful Dead (or related) music and rotating exhibitions.

"We're not looking for any old hippies, just qualified archivists," said Christine Bunting, head of special collections at the McHenry Library. "Of course you have to have an interest in popular culture, the American vernacular and music."

"We're not just looking for Dead Heads, but someone who can organize a collection," she told ABCNews.com.

The Grateful Dead, whose songs celebrated personal freedom and mind-altering drugs, emerged in the San Francisco ballroom scene of the 1960s and broke up, sort of, after Jerry Garcia's death in 1995.

The remaining band members recently donated their entire collection to UCSC: press clippings, photographs, tickets, backstage passes, promotional materials, business records, posters, T-shirts and other Dead merchandise.